I'm No Princess
by the Under-Cover Fangirl
Summary: She's exactly what you are-- a hopeless fan girl. Meet Takara, the fairy tale obsessed kunoichi with a long line of crushes and musical numbers to back them all. COMPLETED
1. Enter: Shizute Takara!

Nervous Takara sat in class at the Ninja Academy for the first time as the room was made bright by the yellow sunlight. She was getting along well with the other children in her class, making light conversation with them and being surrounded by them, but having to answer the same questions over and over.

"What's your name?" a friendly six-year-old girl inquired.

"Uh-- My name's Shizute (pronounced _shee-ZOO-tay_) Takara."

"Where are you from?" a mildly interested boy questioned.

"Tanzaku Town is where I was born and lived until now."

"Why'd ya move?" an overzealous girl more so announced than asked.

"Well-- my dad got a job at the Konoha Hospital..."

The apparent sensei, Iruka, came in to begin class and her crowd scattered to their seats, making Takara sigh in gratitude. Without bothering to introduce Takara to the class, he went right into the lesson, earning more gratitude from timid Takara. It wasn't until a compellingly cute boy, tied in rope, was flung by another sensei into the classroom did Takara think this new town held any interest.

He had a cute face with cheeks lovably stuffed with yet-to-be-grown-out-of baby fat. Blonde hair, like sunshine, puffed out in spiky tufts from his head. Baby blue eyes to die for, and mysterious slits on his cheeks. The fairy tales Takara had heard as a child, along with the romance stories she had overheard her mother reading aloud to herself when she thought she was alone, were building in Takara.

"Iruka-san! Control your student!" he demanded.

"NARUTO!!" Iruka shouted into the boy's sweet face, making Takara cringe at the sensei she thought was gentle. The other children rolled their eyes at what the had become used to. "What did you do now!!"

"Naruto!!" the other teacher pointed at Naruto, "was vandalizing the teacher's lounge!! Trying to set traps in the refrigerator and on the ceiling fan!!"

Takara let the name set into her mind... Naruto... it was sweet and reminded her of... ramen? Yes, naruto went in ramen_a_, but it went along better with lollipops. Yes, Takara decided Naruto instead went with those lollipops that were huge-sized and had a swirl going into the middle. Sweet, sweet, Naruto.

"Go sit down, Naruto! We'll talk about this **after class**!!"

Naruto turned to look, pouting, at the class contemptuously judging him. His expression turned to surprise when a pretty girl sitting in the back row lifted her books from the seat next to her and gave him a come-hither stare.

After Class

The kids were piling out of the classroom, but Iruka called to Naruto.

"Naruto!! Where do you think you're going?! I said I'd have a talk with you after class!!"

Naruto and Takara shared a fleeting look but Naruto proceeded to the front of the classroom.

From the time of 3:00 to 3:26, Takara winced at every criticism and disapproval in Iruka's lecture, as she had her ear to the door, listening in. Some of the words were drowned out by the thickness of the wooden door, but most of it was clear. The speaking stopped for a while and Takara wondered if she should leave or not. Her reluctance caused her grief, however, as Naruto opened the door, to see a shocked girl through his more shocked expression.

"What were you doing?" Naruto placed his hands on his hips, suspicious as to why he was being eavesdropped on. People didn't normally take interest in him.

"I--I--I-- uh..."

Iruka, with one arm holding a bunch of papers to his side, came to the door to leave, but ended up smiling on the two.

"You waited here for Naruto?" The two children turned and looked in surprise him, one astounded that he had figured out such a thing and the other astounded that it would even happen.

"Well-- yes... I was.. going to see if Naruto-kun wanted to go to the playground or.. something. But he had to stay behind so I thought I'd wait for him..."

"Have fun, you two!" Iruka bantered, as he waved behind his head, walking away. Instead of leaving, as he implied, however, he lingered around the corner.

Nothing but silence was heard for a few moments. Then, said a cute, blonde boy:

"Want to go get some ice cream?"

**Author Stuff**

I can't wait to write this!! Please, oh, please keep me motivated to writing this, whether in the form of loving reviews or flames!! I HAVE to finish this!! (Summer Resolution Thing: Finish at least one fan fiction!!)

And don't worry, I WILL get more guys in here!! ;D (LOL!)

**Explanations**

_a_: Naruto's name is an ingredient that goes into ramen, and that's what Takara is referring to. Ironic, eh?


	2. Sleeping Beauty Staying Up Late

"... And they all lived happily ever after," Takara's mother, Fumiya, finished as she closed the thick, golden fairy tale stories book.

"Oh, Mommy... _I _want to be like Sleeping Beauty! I want Prince Charming to wake me from my nightmares!"

"Taka, that's an awfully odd thing for a girl your age to be saying..." Fumiya smiled and rolled her eyes lovingly. "_But it's no wonder that she wants to be a princess... She is a little girl..._"

"Oh Mommy..." Takara danced around the room like a princess at the Ball with her purple teddy bear in her arms. "Can I be a princess one day?"

"Taka, you wanted to be a ninja, and our father and I decided if you trained you could be. Now you want to be a princess?" "_I don't have the heart to tell her I can't make it happen..._"

"Mommy, I still want to be a ninja! Hm... I know, I'll be a Ninja Princess!!" Fumiya laughed at her daughter's childishness. This didn't discourage Taka in the least.

"Ninja Princess! I'm Ninja Princess Taka!"

"Settle down, Taka. It's time for bed. I wouldn't have read the story if I knew it would get you wiled up." Taka's mother gave her a scornful look.

"Yes m'am!" Taka scrambled into bed and her mother turned off the light, with a "good night".

Taka closed her eyes and did what she always did to make herself fall asleep: feign dreams. In other words, she'd imagine something to lull herself to sleep without actually being asleep.

In Taka's awake-dream, a beautiful princess in a gorgeous blue gown walked the marble stone halls of a palace with her long, golden hair trailing behind her. She had brown eyes with a fleck of gold, and was basically an older version of Taka. She made her way into a garden, where flowers and hedges seemed to last forever.

As she made her way to the center, where a fountain spewing crystalline liquid sat, a handsome blonde boy came to meet her. Without any words, they took each other's hands were about to kiss, when a noise came from the window.

Taka groggily sat up, cursing the bird that had probably flown into it. She laid back down, preparing to finish the fantasy, but heard more knocks. She looked and saw pebbles being thrown at the window. Taka looked out of the window, and saw her real Prince Charming. She quickly but quietly changed out of her night gown into some play clothes to go down and meet with Naruto.

"Naru-kun! Naru-kun!" Taka celebrated as she climbed down the vine covered wall of her house, glad that she wasn't going to end this day without interest. "What is it, Naru-kun?"

"Come on, I have an idea! We're gonna play a prank on the teachers," Naruto excitedly whispered.

"Okay, Naru-kun! What are we gonna do?"

**At The Academy**

When the two arrived in the teacher's lounge, Taka saw that Naruto had brought flour, gelatin powder, and... twenty cartons of milk?!

"Naru-kun, what are you doing with all of this?"

Naruto giggled mischievously. "We can put the flour on the ceiling fan so when they turn it on it'll fly everywhere! And we can put the gelatin powder in their water system so they'll only get gelatin! And with the milk, we'll take the top off the freezer while it's closed, and pour all the milks in, so by morning it'll all be frozen!"

"That's genius, Naru-kun!!" Forty-five minutes or so of setting up and tossing random jokes, Takara nervously asked Naruto a question.

"Naru-kun, what's your favorite fairy tale story?"

"Fairy tale story? I don't like fairy tale stories!"

"Why-- Why not!?"

"Well-- Well-- they're girly!!"

"Naru-kun, don't lie to me! I know when you're lying! What's the real reason? You know you can tell me."

"Well--" He nervously rubbed his neck. "I don't know any fairy tales..."

"Oh Naru-kun, I'll tell you all the fairy tale stories I know!" And she did.

**Five Hours Later**

"And they all lived happily ever!!" Takara proclaimed.

"Woah... THAT'S AWESOME!! I WANNA BE A HERO LIKE THOSE GUYS!!"

"Shhh!! Shhh!! Naru-kun, quiet!! Someone will hear!!"

"Ah, don't worry. No one will hear us! They're all gone home. It's already 3:45 in the morning so no one won't be here, duh."

"Okay... Naru-kun, what did you really, REALLY think of those stories?"

"It's awesome!" His eyes became stars. "I want to fight off dragons and bad guys!!"

"No-- Naru-kun-- I mean, of the princesses. What do you think of the princesses?"

"What? I don't want to be a princess."

"No, no, Naru-kun-- that's not what I meant." Taka stuttered for a bit, than carried on. "Naruto, what do you think of the princesses? Which was your favorite?"

"I don't know, I guess they're all pretty much the same."

Taka's mouth fell to the ground. "NO!! THEY'RE NOT!!"

"What's the matter?! Why are you yelling?!"

"NARUTO!!-- ugh!! Fine..." Taka let go that her dreams were being dismissed. "Well, my favorite is Sleeping Beauty. Will you... be my Prince Charming?" Taka bashfully asked, blushing.

"Yeah! I'll fight off all of the bad guys and stuff..." Naruto drawled on his future heroic feats, but Taka's stomach fluttered.

"Naru-kun, I **do **believe you'll be Hokage one day."

"You-- you do?!"

"Mm-hm!" Taka trapped Naruto in a hug, but he didn't mind so much.

"Hehe..." Naruto giggled nervously and blushed. "Taka-chan..." He sniffed her shoulder. "You smell like strawberries!"

"Uh-- thank you, Naru-kun." Taka yawned, her eyelids tugging down. She laid her head on the hard wood floor beneath her, pulling an equally sleepy Naruto down with her.

"Night, Taka-chan..."

"Good night, Naru-kun." Taka looked up at the sleeping Naruto and imagined him in shining armor. She closed her eyes and fell into slumber. Her dreams fell into place sweetly

However, bitter sweetly, the best friends' prank would have been successful, had they not fallen asleep at the crime scene. (Though neither of them regretted it.)

_Sleeping Beauty, in her tale,_

_Fell into deep rest._

_But staying up late with the prince,_

_You tell me which is best._

**Author's Corner**

I know you'll soon notice a pattern in my chapters, but that is on purpose. Okay? Okay.

**Shout Outs**

_**kuro no kokoro**_: Thank you soooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOOooooooOOOOOoooooo much for reviewing!! You're my first review EVER and you'll go down in the hall of fame!! And yeah, its puppy love... but stuff like that can escalate, you know? ;D

_Dominisk_: Thanks, I'll try not to make it boring! And she might go with Naruto, and she might not... (but she most likely absolutely will not... I have other plans... :D)


	3. Back To The Nightmares

The light shined through the windows of the classroom as it did that fateful year ago, when best friends Naruto and Takara met. However, this day would be very different.

Since that day, though, they'd had too many adventures to count, though Taka did. She wrote about it in her diary, that she wrote in every night. One time, her and Naruto snuck into the movie theater, stayed there all night watching the movies that were yet to be released to the public, and replaced a lot of the film with funny, silly pictures. Once the fire had settled from that incident, the "Terrible Two" took diapers from the local nursery, tied them to baloons, and let them over the town. Needless to say, they fell down eventually (this being quite humorous). And of course, there were the many, many, many incidents that went undiscovered.

Takara sat reading at her desk, when Naruto ran in excited and slammed his hands down on the desk in front of her.

"Taka-chan! Taka-chan! Guess what..." He leaned in to whisper. "I have a girl I like!" Taka's heart fluttered. Could this be what she was waiting for him to say?

After a month of knowing him, Taka told her mother that she found a boy she liked very much. Her mother told her that she was too young for that by far and that it was just puppy love, but Taka decided... well, she hadn't decided on anything. But thinking about her Naru-kun made her giddy, so she decided to dismiss the question.

"I'm sorry, Naru-kun, could you repeat that? I was zoned out."

"I said, it's Sakura-chan!" he said in a happy whisper.

"You... you like Sakura-chan?!"

"Shush! Don't be so loud. And yeah, she's my crush! She's really pretty!"

"But-- But-- Naruto, I--"

"Hold that thought, Taka-chan. Sakura-chan!" Naruto ran to Sakura as she came in, leaving Takara with her thoughts. Her poor, heart broken thoughts.

Now, as a kind writer, I won't burden you with the excruciating details of Takara's thoughts, but for the child she was the weight of the pain hurt deeply. For, even though it was puppy love, her first heartbreak stung all too deeply.

Unknown to her, a pair of onyx eyes bore into her back with curiosity.

_Love is blessing,_

_But it can be a curse._

_Her prince loves another?_

_Could this get any worse?_

**Author's Corner**

Well, look at that! Wonder who that could be... ; )

**Shout Outs**

_queen of punk_: Don't worry, they'll be out of the academy soon. Most of the planned chapters will be out of the academy, but we've got to work out of it first. I mean, what's a fan fiction that doesn't leave the academy?


	4. Bad Dreams Turn Sweet

"Hey, Takara." Takara stiffened at Ami's taunting voice. "What's your problem, you've been so quiet lately. Normally you're so loud." Takara packed up her bag and kept her face hidden, refusing to answer, and hoping to get out of the classroom as soon as possible. The best way to deal with bullies was to ignore them. "Come on, Princess! What's your deal, freak?"

"I don't wanna talk," Taka choked out. "Please leave me alone." It had been two weeks since Naruto hurt her feelings the way he did, and she'd been avoiding him for fear that she would cry in front of him. Not that he'd noticed, though.

"Whatever, loser. You may not want to talk about it, but I understand why you're acting so dramatic. Don't be a baby!"

"I'm not! Just-- Just-- go away! I don't want to talk to you!" Taka took her satchel in her arms and turned to leave, but Ami yanked her ponytail and pulled her back.

"Let go, Ami!!" Taka struggled to release herself but Ami only yanked again, harder. "I'm gonna go home! Leave me alone!"

"Why should I?" Ami teased.

"Let go! Let go!"

"What? Is it my fault that Naruto-loser doesn't like you?"

"Stop that! Naruto-san is no loser!"

"Oh, so you call him Naruto-_san _now? What happened to Naru-kun? Oh, is it because--"

"Leave her alone," a boy ordered and grabbed Ami's wrist, but Takara couldn't see who.

"Okay, whatever you say, Sasuke-kun, but I don't know why you care about this loser." Ami let go of Taka's hair and left, followed by her friends.

Sasuke? Takara knew him. From the Uchiha clan, and her parents respected his parents very much. But she never actually met him.

"You should really stand up for yourself, you know." Sasuke's eyes widened when he saw Taka's shoulders shaking.

"I-- I-- I'm sorry I bothered you like this. Thank you for helping me-- but-- but--" Taka whimpered, trying not to cry, but failing.

"Come on, don't cry." Sasuke placed his hand on her shoulder. "You didn't do anything wrong. You just need to stand up for yourself." The Uchiha seven-year-old smiled.

"Th-Thank you, Sasuke-kun. You're very nice." Taka's short-lived tears subsided. "Do you... want to go to the playground? We could-- um-- play before we go home, if that would be okay..."

"All right!" Sasuke eagerly blushed.

**At The Playground**

Takara ran, giggling, towards the large jungle gym to catch her breath. She stood, opposite to Sasuke, on the other side of the slide. He was panting and laughing as well, enjoying his game of tag with his new friend.

Little Taka made a lunge to the swing set, and just barely grabbed the chain ropes when Sasuke caught her ankles.

"I got you!"

"No you didn't!"

"What do you mean I didn't?!"

"I touched the swing before you tagged me!!"

"No you didn't!" Sasuke defended himself.

"Uh-huh, I did!" Taka fought playfully.

"No you di-- what are you doing?" Takara was climbing onto the swing set.

"Let's swing! I love to swing!" Taka climbed onto the swing on her stomach.

Sasuke sat down on the swing, confused on what she was doing. "Why are you getting on your stomach? You're supposed to sit on the swing.

"Well, I don't know how to." Takara admitted. She kicked the ground and straightened her arms and legs like a bird as she swung.

"Cut that out, it looks so weird." Sasuke chuckled. "Here, I'll teach you."

Sasuke got Takara to sit on the swing and he pushed her to start her up. "Now, just pump with your legs."

Taka flailed her legs, but to no avail. "It won't work! I can't do it."

"Don't say that, you can! Just keep your legs together and pump. Put your whole body into it." Takara put all her force and will into pumping, and did it! She was swinging and soaring through the air. Nothing had ever felt so exhilarating to her!

"Sasu-kun! Sasu-kun! I'm doing it, Sasu-kun!"

_Princesses aren't real,_

_Fairy tales are fake._

_But when dreams are so sweet,_

_Who wants to wake?_

**Author's Corner**

I'll keep 'em coming, people. I'm gonna try to write one a day, but that's no promise. I'll be going to sleep away camp in a bit, but I'll have new chapters when I come back.

**Shouts Outs**

_queen of punk:_ Yeah, Naruto-chan was really stupid, but hey, he was a kid. He can't help it, but he'll be coming around very soon... ; )

_Cerulean89: _Thanks!! I'll try to.


	5. Cinderella Can't Swim!

"I spy with my little eye... something blue." Taka said as she swung lightly on her swing with her friend doing the same, the day slowly drawing to an end.

Sasuke thought hard for a few seconds. "The sky."

"No."

"My shirt."

"No."

"The slide."

"No."

"My shoes? Your shoes?"

"No."

"I don't know, then."

"That ball over there!" Takara pointed to the kick ball she spotted in the corner of her eye. She leaped off the swing towards it, followed by the curious boy. Taka kicked it high in the air and it fell on the other side of the play ground. It bounced off of the playground platform, onto and past the road, and over the edge where the flowing river brimmed.

"Oh no! We have to get it!" Takara ran towards the edge and jumped up to look over the wall, holding on to it.

"Wait, Taka-chan! What are you doing?! That's dangerous!!" Sasuke ran up behind her, but it was too late. She had fallen over the edge, and fell sprawling down into the turbulent waters. Takara looked up through the ice cold blanket to see a blurry, panicking Sasuke.

Takara wasn't sure what to do. She tried to swim, for she knew how, but it was too icy cold to dare. She was alone in seemingly limitless waters and felt helpless like Cinderella had, that eternity in the house of her stepmother.

Everything was cold. Utterly cold.

**An Unknown Amount Of Time Later**

Takara woke, shivering, wrapped in a thick, warm blanket, but it was no consolation. When she did, several grown men, most likely her saviors, came and checked to see if she was all right, heavy with concern. She was in a daze, but told them that she was fine.

Her parents came running with hugs of relief. She felt touched that her mother brought her terrible two-year-old daughter even though to go anywhere with her was horrible. Her father left work at the hospital to come and see her, and they were all more than glad that she was all right. However, she had a deep fear that she wouldn't be allowed to go to the playground after school everyday with Sasuke like she had been doing. That reminded her of what she had felt blank without remembering. Sasuke.

She searched around desperately and found Sasuke looking up shamefully at his father. Sasuke's father, as Takara had come to know him, was pressuring to Sasuke and always made him feel disappointed in. She told her parents that she wanted to go talk to Sasuke, and needless to say they were reluctant in letting her go off by herself (especially her overprotective mother), but they allowed for it.(considering it was only leaving to see someone a few feet away).

"S-Sasuke-k-kun?" Taka spoke while shivering. Sasuke's father gave him a look, but left the two alone. The first thing Sasuke did when they were alone was hug the freezing girl, and she hugged him back, glad for the affection and warmth.

The seven year old boy apologized for not being able to save her, but she apologized for being so clumsy.

"You need to watch out for yourself, Taka-chan. You're so helpless." Sasuke smiled at his friend's clumsiness.

"I know, I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Taka apologized but smiled, as well.

"You're like-- that kitten over there," he decided, pointing to a cute, gray kitten with pale blue eyes, trying to make its way through the crowd of concerned people.

"Oh, I love kitten, Sasu-kun!!" Takara got excited and her eyes dazzled over the small animal. Sasuke chuckled at the girl's girlishness.

"By the way, Taka-chan, you dropped your shoe when you fell." He handed her her tan sandal.

"Thank you, Sasu-kun." Takara couldn't help but see herself dressed in a blue, sparkling dress, and being handed back her glass slipper, by Prince Charming.

She stared hard into the face of seven-year-old boy and imagined the same shining armor her fool's prince wore, but this time, she was certain this love was true. Sasuke was confused by this silence, but didn't mind it so much when he was engulfed in a tight hug.

That night, all the way home, Takara was singing to herself, "A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes".

_Cinderella is such a klutz!_

_But clumsy as she is,_

_Life is fine and she doesn't mind_

_As long as she is his!_

**Author's Corner**

Ya, I just decided to write mini-poems (and if you check, for every chapter) to sum up every chapter. And if you want your OC worked into any part of my story, just review me with the answers to the following questions, and I'll be glad to put you in somewhere. (Just no guarantee that you'll be important!!) PS, all Mary Sues will be throttled!!

**Name(Japanese or none at all):**

**Age:**

**Hair:**

**Eyes/Face/Complexion:**

**Body Style:**

**Clothes:**

**Village/Past:**

**Jutsu(be unique and specific!):**

**Traits/Personality:**

**Extra(anything I might want to know):**

**Shout Outs**

_Queen Of Punk: _Yeah, but don't get too attached to Sasuke. ; ) (That's foreshadowing right there, people!)


	6. The Ball Is Over

_'So this is it... it's real, isn't it? They're all dead because I couldn't protect them... and Itachi. Itachi killed them all!!' _Sasuke clenched his fists and teeth. _'For mother... for father... for auntie and uncle... I'll kill Itachi. I'll have my revenge and I'll do it for them. I'll do it if I have to surrender my life... and never get closer to anyone. My only family is in the past.'_

Sasuke sat up in his hospital bed. The room was vacant. Vacant like his expression.

His didn't acknowledge the door opening, to reveal a timid Takara. That entire year, Taka had grown closer and closer to her ever dearest Sasu-kun. Every day, the two went to the playground after school and played until sundown. On weekends they'd headed into town and browse through toy stores and candy shops, though Sasuke always complained that he didn't like sweets. Everything was going perfect. Was.

"Sasu-kun... I don't know exactly what happened, but I heard some... Sasu-kun--" While trying to comfort him, Taka was interrupted by Sasuke's mumbling. She placed her hand on his.

"What is that, Sasu-kun?"

"I said, go away."

"Wh--What?" Taka was only a little fazed by this.

"Leave. Go away."

"Sasuke--"

"Didn't you hear me?! Go!!"

"Sasuke, stop it!! I had to come into work with my father to see you and it was very hard to get here. I'm not just about to leave and let this all go--"

"Just-- Just-- Just leave me alone!! Don't come back! I never want to see you again!!" Sasuke took the glass cup of water from his table at the bed's side and threw it onto the floor.

"Sasuke--" Takara ran out of the hospital room, tears making rivers down her face. Why had he acted so harshly? Weren't they friends? Now she knew, they could never be more than friends. It was obvious. Her ebony-haired, onyx-eyed Prince Charming was no more. Nothing but an illusion. Like a dream, fading away.

She walked down the stone stairs and out of the hospital building, crying all the way. It didn't matter who saw her because hospitals weren't a place where it was unusual for one to cry.

The streets were being stalked by a morose little eight year old(now, she was eight, but not but a few months ago she celebrated her birthday party with her ex-Prince, but that memory was now too painful to recall, so she begged it to blur into her past as she was trying to do with her other Sas- **him **memories)

As she dragged her feet along the path home, Takara choked out the song, "So This Is Love", as Cinderella sang, but this time, it had a painfully bitter twist.

The poor girl barely noticed when she ran into a boy with the most haunting white eyes.

"Why are you crying?" he asked, but his voice still ached with contempt.

"I- I- I- I'm sad..." Taka cried. "I'm sorry I ran into you."

"You don't have to cry about it," he scolded. Takara giggled.

"That's not why I'm sad." Her words were contorted by the sobs that she was suppressing, but for some reason, they were beginning to subside.

"You shouldn't walk around so vulnerable. You really have no obligations, do you?"

"Huh?" She stared at him blankly. "Oh." She giggled again. "You use really big words."

"Hm." The boy scoffed. "You're so free-spirited. You should harden up. You're in the ninja academy, right? You're traits don't fit that of a ninja."

"I'm tough! I just... like to have fun."

"You need to train more. What is a shinobi with no strength?"

"Well, you're so strong, tough guy, why don't you train me?" Takara teased playfully.

"Hm?" the white-eyed boy seemed slightly perturbed. "Fine then."

"What?" Taka hadn't expected him to take up this offer.

"Come to Training Field 14 and I'll take you to where I train from there. Don't be late if you want to improve."

"Oh-- okay." The boy turned to leave, but Takara stopped him. "Wait! Um-- what's your name?"

"Hyuga Neji."

"I'm Shizute Takara. You can call me Taka."

"Hm."

Takara watched the pale-eyed wonder boy walk away. So what if he was cold and distant? No princess would ever give up on finding her Prince Charming. He hadn't proved himself Prince material just yet, but he had proved to be the cure for a freshly broken heart. Maybe... Just maybe... the little girl could love again.

She skipped home that night, singing happily, "So This Is Love".

_The ball is over, _

_And the dream is done._

_But a true princess _

_Always shines in the sun!_

**Author's Corner**

I know what you're thinking: She's found ANOTHER one? Well, yeah! I have to work them all in somehow, right. ;

**Shout Outs**

Thank you too, Ceru-chan, Angel-chan, Domi-kun, and Punk-chan for sending in reviews and OCs. I'll try hard to work you all in!


	7. Swap: Princess Saves The Prince?

Takara was catching her breath while shoveling down the delicious egg and chicken domburi from her bento box for strength.

She had taken a small break from training with Neji, and she wanted to be down as soon as she could. She never knew training could be so much fun! Sure enough, it was all the same type of training, but something about Neji... made it better.

Taka looked at the handsome, pale-eyed wonder boy she had met six weeks before. He had proved beyond the reasonable doubt that he was not Prince Charming material, but that didn't mean she still couldn't be a princess.

He was more like-- Eric. The man from The Little Mermaid? The one who longed to be freed from his family's oppressiveness by the love of another? And Taka was more than happy to become the princess of Atlantis AND a mermaid.

"This break is long enough." Neji closed the top on his empty bento box. "Come here and we'll practice shuriken accuracy."

"Yes, Neji-kun! I need to work on that."

"Now, its all a matter of how you hold the shuriken. Hold it here, in between these two fingers, and throw it."

Takara did, but it didn't even make near the target. It fell to the ground before it went anywhere.

"Hm... you need to throw harder."

"Okay, Neji-kun. I'll try harder." This time, Takara threw it, but this time the balance was off, so it flew around and like an enraged butterfly and both Neji and Taka ducked. It landed in the ground near the stream. Neji went over to pick it up, giving Takara a brilliant(to her) idea.

"Neji-kun, I have an idea."

"Hm? What is it?"

"Let's go swimming, Neji-kun!"

"We're training now. Don't be foolish."

"Oh please, Neji-kun! It's such a beautiful day! Just today, please?" Takara cutely laced her fingers together and begged him, unintentionally making Neji blush. He couldn't say no.

Splashing about in the yellow-white sun light, two immersed children found themselves wading into deeper water.

Of course, after last year's incident in the river, Taka's parents made her take swimming lessons, so there was seemingly no threat.

Neji, enjoying himself more than he thought he should, stepped on a stone in the stream, and slipped. He caught onto a current, and went down the river. Of course, he knew how to swim, but the current was too strong.

Takara was immediately distraught and ran up the river bank, following Neji down the stream from the side of the water.

The river got deeper and deeper, until Neji was fighting the current of the main stream.

The waterfall in the not-so-distance was no consolation.

It wasn't massive, or Niagra Falls-like, but it was far from small.

Before anything else could be done, Neji plummeted down to the river below to a possible watery grave.

Takara, on instinct, dived down the waterfall after him.

**One Plunge Later**

The water was teasingly lukewarm, and surrounded Taka like the vastness of life itself.

Neji was no challenge to find.

He was breathless in the water, floating in the bright depth with light shining on him through the surface, surrounded by nothing but water itself.

His mouth was open, and that wasn't a good sign.

Takara carried him to the surface and put his head above water. His throat made a gasping noise, but he didn't proceed to breath.

Taka put him on the shore, but the gentle caresses of the river's delta still reached Neji's legs.

Takara pounded on Neji's chest, trying to revive him, but feared for the worst: that she would have to give him mouth-to-mouth. That was something she would most certainly not to, for too many reasons to list.

Though it was totally not the time, she thought of Ariel looking over on the unconscious Eric, as she sang "Part Of Your World".

It was uncalled for, but Taka began to mutter the lyrics in her sweet, angelic voice.

The Hyuga boy began to stir. First he turned about a bit, and then sat up with his eyes open.

"Neji-kun, I was so afraid for you! I'm so sorry, that was all my fault."

"Well. We won't be doing that again," he said with a sort of condescending air about it, as though he was suppressing annoyance. But Taka didn't mind. She deserved it, and it was some of what made Neji... Neji.

But still, this time it sort of hurt.

Tears began to pour from her eyes.

"I'm so sorry Neji-kun, it was all my fault. Please forgive me. If I hadn't... then... then... you wouldn't have been put in such danger. I'm useless..."

"Hm?" Neji was only slightly taken aback, but that was still a lot for him. "Stop it. It isn't befitting for a ninja to carry on like that. Instead of behaving like that, why don't you try and fix yourself, if you're so useless. You'll never improve yourself if you don't train. Your fate as a shinobi is sure to be a failing one."

Neji got up to walk away, and though he couldn't see it, he knew Takara had on the warm, beloved smile that seemed to radiate light.

He didn't understand it about her, but every time her gave her a lecture, or any sort of criticism, she'd smile and give off a loving glow, with the kind of smile that brought wilting flowers to life.

He didn't understand it, but he didn't question, because he enjoyed it.

The reason, however, why Takara smiled that way was simple. It was her, I-know-I'm-cared-for-smile.

It showed itself once in five pink moons, but when it did, it shone a graceful light around her that her herself wasn't capable of achieving.

Clumsy or not, she loved to feel loved.

Her brilliant smile faded into a satisfied grin as she tagged along behind her not-so-Prince-Charming.

_Hasn't she learned to avoid water?_

_What a foolish young girl!_

_But still, she's a savior to her "Eric"_

_And a beacon to the world!_

**Author's Corner**

Review! I'm telling you, it makes me update faster... come on, you can be my first flame. : And you get to be in the cool shout out list.

**Shout Outs(regulars get nicknames)**

_moogle in paradaisu: _Thank you! I try. :

_Punk-chan: _Yeah, but as broken as an eight year old can be. Don't worry, she'll really get her heart broken one day... (that's foreshadowing right there, people!) And I got your OC. I have a few ideas for her... :

_Domi-kun: _Rest assured, I have big plans for your OC. And I know, I'm a cruel writer. :P Nah, don't worry. She always seems to turn out okay, eh? (that's the point of the heroine --')

_Ceru-chan: _Thanks! I already have plans for the OC, though they're a bit tweaked from what you sent me. And if you want me to update... I like da reviews.


	8. Curses And Cupcakes

**I'm No Princess, Chapter Eight**

**Curses And Cupcakes**

Takara didn't understand.

She didn't understand why Neji's family had taken him from her while they were training. She didn't understand why she hadn't seen him for three days. She didn't understand why she wasn't seeing him, and she didn't understand why he would avoid her.

They'd been best friends for a year and so Taka had become wary that she might lose her friend. She'd realized now that she hadn't kept one best friend for more than a year or so and decided it was a curse some evil witch sent upon her or something like that, even though it terribly childish for a nine-year-old.

The entire year, she'd learned to except Neji that he didn't often express his feelings or become interested in fun things. He'd made her stronger with training, and though she didn't know it, she made him more optimistic with his... situation.

Taka was carrying a bento box she used to carry chocolate cupcakes in. Her mom always said vanilla cupcakes are what you bring when you don't know what to bring because everyone loves chocolate.

She approached the Hyuga compound. Many of the leaving Hyugas who had passed her gave her nasty looks, but she tried to ignore them. She considered sharing her cupcakes with them to cheer them up and keep them from being made at her, but she had to save them for Neji.

While navigating her way through the twists and turns on the Hyuga property she came upon the Neji's quarters, a basic and practical bedroom, the one she was looking for.

She came in to see a grieving Neji, sitting on her bed and looking at the floor. It wasn't uncommon to see him sulking because his nature was so, but it always made Takara worried.

"Neji-kun?..." Takara was unsettled because she'd always seen him distraught and annoyed, but never... hateful.

"I'm not to see you anymore."

"... What?"

"It is the will of the Hyuga. You are a distraction."

"Neji, I don't know what's going on, but if you'll explain it me, you know I'll listen to you and do whatever I have to."

"You have to leave. And never come back." Neji was tortured with what he had to say. He'd made a wonderful friend, but she distracted him from his born purpose, as the Main Branch had decided. "I don't want to look at you anymore."

The last lie was the hardest to utter. "I hate you."

True, there were things he hated about her. That she was someone he felt he needed to be around. That she was free, like a canary. Someone who could do whatever she wanted and had liberty. But even though this wasn't his choice, he'd be separated from her sometime. She's a free bird, and he's caged. One day, she'd fly away.

Takara looked as though a bucket of shock had been poured over her.

"Why?"

"Do I need a reason?"

It wasn't like him to be so... revolted. Had she done something

"Leave."

And she did. For some reason, though it stung badly she'd lost a dear friend(and maybe more) she kind of knew it would happen.

Takara decided then that she'd stop looking for a prince. This tale had turned out more like the depressing actual book, The Little Mermaid, where she never made Eric fall for her. She'd hoped it would be like the child's story she heard, but her evil witch's curse kept her from becoming human permanently, and she turned into a fish again.

But, whatever! Who needs a prince?

She could be an independent princess! She didn't need a man to make her!

She fisted the air as she inwardly pep talked herself.

Though both Takara and Neji knew the true feelings from the situation, neither would ever admit to it.

There was nothing to be done.

Or yet, for that matter. For if Takara had taught Neji anything, that would be there is almost always hope.

And Takara left the cupcakes at the door, for if her mother had taught her anything, it was everyone needed cupcakes, always.

_There's a time and place for everything,_

_As Mother always said._

_Even though her prince is gone, nothing's better_

_Than chocolate bread._


	9. Grow Up, Chill Out, Love Pink

Shizute Takara had turned twelve with grace, as she phrased it. She knew she would have to except her old age.

Changes from the age of nine to twelve had been few.

She'd not fallen in love, and she found that accounting for something. She just consoled herself with countless books.

But bookworm, she is not. Childish? Yes. Clumsy? Yes. But book worm? No.

She'd made friends with many people, girls and boys. One of her favorite friends was a spunky girl named Yamanaka Ino. Though a little self centered and material, Ino was always outgoing and ready for having fun.

Both Takara and Ino saw Sakura as sort of a rival(even though Taka didn't like Naruto anymore, the spark was still there), but Ino was very boisterous about it.

They'd go shopping, have sleep overs, and perform all manners of girly activities.

Being friends with Ino made Takara very popular, though she didn't notice nor care.

When Takara was sick of being around crowds of people and ignoring "scandalous" gossip, she enjoyed the company of sweet, down-to-earth Hyuga Hinata.

Hinata was incurably shy and Takara couldn't see why. They were opposites in most all matters, but they made the best of friends.

For some reason, Ino and Hinata didn't get along perfectly, or well at all. Taka wished her two best friends could get along better, but she excepted they were worlds apart.

As to her Princes of the past, Uzumaki Naruto hadn't changed in the slightest. Still ever so brave and proud!

It took him a while to innerly adjust to that he and Taka weren't friends that few years ago, but he bitterly decided that she was like everyone else that would have to learn to respect him.

Takara still avoided contact with him, but defended him whenever the situation called for it or Ino went too far. (It's not like Ino is really mean, just lose on her words.)

As for Sasuke, he had become hard and cruel in Takara's eyes. She knew that his parents had been-- killed by his brother(though she didn't like to think about that).

She wanted so bad to talk to him about it, and to ease his pain, but he had been made a different person, and no matter how much she disliked it, she couldn't help the him she once knew.

She just wished he wasn't someone she had _used _to know.

In Sasuke's opinion, he had long since decided that she wasn't important to him anymore. She couldn't be. He knew that if he wanted to obtain the Mangekyo that he would have to kill his best friend.

And he couldn't let Takara be that person.

Also, to Takara's dismay, Neji had become colder and colder to her. She didn't know why: she supposed it had something to do with his family, or that he simply became sick of her.

Neji had first been angry with her because the Main Branch said she distracted him from his life's purpose. His feigned anger had been made real, however, when he found that she had befriended Hinata.

Through her reminiscing, Takara's name was called by Iruka.

"Shizute Takara."

She proceeded through the door into the testing room with a "good luck" from Ino and an encouraging nod from Hinata, both who had already passed.

Mizuki and Iruka watched her as she performed the jutsu she had practiced endlessly the night before.

Three clones appeared beside Taka. She gave her sensei a hopeful look, and when he nodded, Takara spazed out with squeals of joy and waving of arms.

"Takara-san?" Iruka said scoldingly, giving her a smiling "um-what?" look.

"Oh, sorry. I know. Ninja doesn't show emotion." She blushed and went to look at the ninja headbands.

And then she saw it.

In all its gloriousness, she saw it.

A ninja headband. _In pink._

"I--Iruka-sensei?" Takara stuttered.

"Yes, Takara-san?" He smiled knowingly.

"Is--Is that--"

"Yes, I requested it because I knew you'd want it."

"Iruka-sensei-- I LOVE YOU!!" She screamed and ran to hug him.

"Eh-- Ta--Taka--" Iruka gasped with his constricted rib cage.

"Oh, right. Sorry, Iruka-sensei." She smiled sheepishly and blushed.

"Well now, watch who you say that to. Now go on, we have other students to attend to." He smiled at his student's utter lack of self control. It wasn't befitting of a ninja, he knew, but it was one of the things that definitely defined Takara.

As Takara celebrated with her friends and was congratulated by her parents, while deciphering where to place her hitai-ate, unaware of the story unfolding for the boy eyeing her sullenly from a swing.

And her place in it.

_Growing up is never fun,_

_But that's something we don't decide._

_The Princess is ready to go out in the world,_

_And it's gonna be a heck of a ride._

**Author's Corner**

Lots of love! Wait see, things are gonna get intense 09. (what's with the nine?) Anyway, review and I update faster. It's simple as that.

**Shout Outs**

_Punk-chan: _Yeah, but you know now they're not exactly floating in nice waters together...

_Domi-kun: _Taka-chan is just full of surprises, isn't she? Well, things are gonna get worse before they get better.


	10. Fussy Much?

Takara cringed with guilt as Naruto was pummeled by the girls in class who adored Sasuke, that being most all of them.

She also had to suppress laughter, because Sasuke and Naruto kissing was way too funny! Luckily, with all the noise, no one heard her except the (surprisingly handsome) boy sitting next to her, who gave her a strange look.

"Aren't you mad?"

"At what? That's quality entertainment."

He gave an amused half-grin. Though he was fair from prince material, he was okay.

Ino sat down on the other side of the boy. She asked him to move, but he responded with "why should I?". Definitely not prince material.

"You'll be split into groups of three." Takara immediately ran through the people she'd want to be partnered with. Ino? Hinata? That would be her dream team!

Then there are all the people she wouldn't mind... Asuka, Kiyoko, Goro, Katsu. All those friends of Ino's.

Taka just didn't want to get put with Sasuke or Naruto. Or Sakura. **(A/N: That's not foreshadowing, FYI.)**

"Team one. . . Team two. . . Team three. . . Team four. . . Team five. . . Team six. . . Team seven, Uzumaki Naruto," Naruto looked up from his daydreaming, and Taka knew he was thinking about his future heroics.

She never did stop believing in him.

"Haruno Sakura," Naruto cheered and Takara's eyes turned to saucers.

"And Uchiha Sasuke." Sakura cheered and Takara's eyes turned to that of cosmic black holes that sucked the joy from all around her.

Sasuke and Naruto swapped insults as Takara's it-figures gloom grew and she dropped her head in defeat. She didn't want to be teamed with them, but them being teamed all together was like getting kicked in the stomach.

And then getting back up and trying to punch whoever kicked you, but tripping, and falling on your face. And getting kicked again.

"Team Eight, Hyuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba, and Aburame Shino." Takara had some relief. Even though she wasn't teamed with her best friend, she was happy because she knew for a fact that Shino and Kiba were okay guys.

(But if they did do something to hurt Hinata in any way, they'd have their esophaguses yanked out and tied around their necks to be hung with) (Though, in retrospect, that's a little strange considering there'd no longer be a throat to choke.)

"Team nine, Shizute Takara--" Taka's thoughts went basically along the lines of "**Ino, please, Ino, for all that is good I need my friend!!**"

"Iga Kichiro, and Manabu Isao."

In Takara's eyes, Kichiro was a decently mannered boy with a dark green tunic and brown spiky that leaned to the side a bit who was a little too quiet. He'd gone to school with the rest of the class for a year but he'd yet to make any friends. He wouldn't be so bad.

Isao, on the other hand, was a notoriously rude boy with black very short spiky hair and a dark blue turtleneck who had a decent amount of friends. He was a bit of a jerk and a gossip, but very smart. He was a little mean to Taka.

In both the opinions Kichiro and Isao, Takara was assumed to be a girly, ditzy, mean dumb blonde in reflection of her friend, Ino. (Takara would have probably said something like, "You don't know me or my friend!")

"Team ten, Yamanaka Ino, Nara Shikamaru, and Akimichi Choji."

And the list went on.

When class let out for lunch, Takara did her best to talk to her teammates, though neither seemed all too pleased by her presence.

"Um--" Takara searched for the right words, because she detected hostility. "We're all a team, right? So should we-- uh-- go eat lunch together?"

There was a frustratingly awkward silence.

"Fine with me." Kichiro said with his face without expression, not wanting to be impolite by expressing his dismay that he'd been placed with her. Not that he disliked her, he just... didn't like her.

Isao gave Taka a contemptuous look and followed.

They arrived on he school's veranda, a balcony where students often ate lunch, and found their previous-class-mates, now-comrades, Team Ten.

Takara giggled, happily, to see her friend. (She was very glad to find her friend in the midst of trying awkwardly to make conversation.)

"Hey, Ino-chan!! Mind if we eat with you?"

Ino gave Isao and Kichiro each once overs. "Sure."

"What is it with the looks, Ino? Why are you such a witch?"

"Excuse me?! How dare you talk to me like that you loser! You want a piece of me?!" Ino proceeded to verbally and physically bash Isao.

"Isao-san, that was kind of rude. But Ino-chan, lay off the guy..."

Kichiro sighed and took out his pork onigiri, as the rest rolled their eyes at the predictability and did the same.

The boy from earlier caught Taka's attention.

She first looked at him staring somewhere. Then she looked out at where he might be staring. Then she traced his vision with her fingers. By now he noticed her.

He sighed. "What are you doing?"

"What are you looking at?"

"The clouds."

"Why?"

He sighed again. "Do I have to explain?"

"Yes." Takara smiled playfully.

He sighed a third time. "The thing I like about the clouds is that they're relaxing. Not annoying," he hinted.

"Oh." Taka was confused.

He sat up from his sitting position to get away from her (admittedly beautiful) face because he suspected condemnation.

"I don't care if it sounds stupid. Don't criticize me for it."

"What? I didn't say anything. And I don't think it sounds stupid."

"Hm?"

"That sounds cool! I like clouds. They're nice and fun to find shapes in-- like there, that's a cat." Takara pointed to a cloud that didn't even remotely look like a cat.

Shikamaru chuckled, and Taka gave him a what-are-you-laughing-at, clueless look.

Takara noticed in the corner of her eye a familiar blonde friend finishing with slapping around Taka's team mate for his rude mouthing. She turned to her own teammates to make an announcement.

"Listen up. As long as we're in the same group, you two are going to follow what I say."

"Fine, fine." Shikamaru surrendered (as if he battled...). _"I don't want to waste my time arguing with Ino..."_

"This girl's always on, isn't she..." Isao remarked in a whisper to Kichiro, as if he didn't have enough last time.

"Excuse me?" Ino asked rhetorically, insulted.

"Nothing, nothing..."

"We should go eat barbecue together sometime soon, as a team," Choji recommended.

"Geez!" Ino put her head in her hand.

"It's no good to fight with Ino about anything, just let it go. It's not as much of a drag that way. You just gotta know how to get around her," Shikamaru whispered to Isao.

Isao scoffed. "I can handle some girl."

Takara's head sunk in between her knees in defeat. Her team and her best friend's team were already enemies!

"Huh?" Shikamaru looked to the window not far off, where Naruto was sneaking up behind Sasuke as he ate. "Naruto!"

"What?" Ino turned, followed by everyone else, to see.

Naruto lunged into the window onto Sasuke. The board keeping it open closed so no one could see the two (most likely) fighting. Nasty words and shuffling could be heard.

Ino balled up her fist. "Naruto, you're gonna get it if you hurt Sasuke-kun!" After some more shuffling, everything went quiet. "What happened?"

Sasuke opened the window and jumped away.

"Naruto must have gotten beaten instead," Shikamaru figured.

"Of course, Naruto is no match for Sasuke-kun," Ino gloated.

"Um..." Takara stuttered, trying to end the situation too full of drama and underlying emotion for her. "We should head back to meet our sensei."

**Back At The Academy**

Each member of Team Nine had a note on their desk. They read:

_Hey maggots! Sorry I'm gonna miss this whatever it is. Meet me in the Tea District tomorrow, early. Be there or be sent back for another year at the academy._

_Lots of love, your _**KILLER**_ sensei._

_PS: I have no shame. I can and will hurt you. So behave. :)_

Geez! That lady sounds like one crazy mutha--

_Why does Ino always fuss?_

_But that's not a big deal._

_'Cause crazy sensei's on the loose!_

_Is that weird lady for real?_

**Author's Corner**

Eh, too long? Too bad. Love ya! If you know me... you know who that letter sounds like. Lots of love, right? And back in chapter four or something, I said something about letting new OCs into the story if you send them in. That offer is still open! And review 'cause it makes me happy. :

**Shout Outs(keep reviewing, you get a nickname! And cake! No, just kidding. No cake for you. Cake for ME. : )**

_Punk-chan: _Yeah, guys are jerks. Too bad they're hot. :P Thanks, lots o' love!

_Domi-kun: _Poor Taka-chan, she's boating on troubled waters, eh? Oh well. No need to worry. Kichiro-kun can help her out... lots of love, thanks for the OC, boi!!

_Moopara-chan: _Thanks! Actually, I often blurt out "I LOVE YOU" to random people... Taka-chan is (only a little bit ') based off of me. Like, the guy who brought me my strawberry short cake at the Hard Rock Cafe? Or the lady who I bought that Hello Kitty lip gloss from at Learning Express? Eh, I'm getting off track. Anyway, thanks!

_Arch-chan: _Yeah she moves on fast, but hey, the kid keeps 'em coming.

_Arch-chan: _Well, Naruto is hurt. He had his first real friend(oops, did I mess up that thing in the real series with Sasuke?) and she left him for reasons unknown to the ignorant boy. And Neji had to leave her because the jerky main branch thought he was shirking his duties as a cadet branch-er(made up word, FYI) and thinking he could defy his fate. So sad, but we're just going to have to fix that, now, aren't we? :

_Hikari-Kasumi: _Thank you! Uh, sorry. I don't know Shaman King, so I don't know Tamao. But it sounds like I'd like her slash him. :


	11. Little Red Birdie: Scavengers Away!

That next day, Takara arrived in the Tea District, groggy and half dead, at four in the morning to find Kichiro already there, sipping hot green tea. An hour later, Isao came, with no loss of expression in that he HATED being up so early.

When ten o'clock was rolling around, the team was beginning to think their sensei wasn't coming.

Then, stumbling as she walked, a reddish brown haired woman with cerulean eyes came towards them.

"Hey kids," she drawled in a sleepy manor. "You my students, eh?" She put her hood over her head, that being attached to a black hoodie, restrained by a green Jounin vest. She dropped down with the seat of her tan cargo pants on the dirt ground. "Cool..." She fell into slumber.

Kichiro gave her a strange look and returned to his book, but Isao and Takara refused to put up with it.

"What are you doing, sleeping??" Taka yelled, her mouth reaching inhuman lengths and her eyes turning to that of frisbees.

"You said we had to get here early!!" Isao did the same.

"This is my early..." She looked up annoyed from her under her hood.

"It's mine, too, but I still got here and four..." Taka pouted.

Isao continued to scold and scream at the woman until she had become so annoyed she screamed back, "ENOUGH ALREADY!!"

"Fine!" She stood up and motioned for the other three to sit down on the bench.

"Why?" Takara inquired.

"Because I like to feel taller than other people!!"

_'What a weirdo... she's already much taller than any of us.' _Taka thought.

"Well... I've seen lots of sensei do this before, so-- uh-- introduce yourselves. I'll go first."

She cleared her throat. "Minohara Kaori. I got a son and an **EX**-husband."

"You wonder why..." Isao whispered to Kichiro. He was then given a glare that screamed DEATH and he shut up.

"Anyway, I like food and water. I dislike pain and dying. My hobbies include breathing and sleeping. My goal is to stay alive for the time being. I'm fully prepared to send you back to the academy **OR WORSE.**"

"But that didn't tell us, like, anything!" Takara complained. Isao rolled his eyes and Kichiro gave a distressed look that she involuntarily used the phrase "like".

"Quit complaining! For that, you're next."

"Oh, okay!" Taka pepped up. "My name Shizute Takara but I prefer to be called Taka. I have a mom, a dad, and a spunky little sister. My hobbies include shopping, reading, admiring nature, singing, playing piano, having sleep overs, training, praying, playing with my pets--"

Kaori cleared her throat.

"Oh, sorry. I like fairy tales, sweets, gentlemen, magazines, books, make up, pink, boutiques, animals, my friends, music, my religion and my God, fashion, everything in nature, like clouds and stars and the moon and--"

Kaori cleared her throat, but this time louder and more annoyed.

"Oh, sorry. Anyway, I dislike, of course, mean people, gross stuff like blood, people who hurt animals, people who hurt people I care about, annoying emotions like jealousy, vegetables, bugs--"

Kaori cleared her throat, but it sounded more like a bomb going off. A very annoyed bomb.

"Oh sorry. Well, my goal is to be a princess."

Kichiro stifled a chuckle and Isao burst out laughing. Kaori gave a skeptical look.

"Shuddup!" Takara angrily defended.

Kaori sighed at her hopelessness, and pointed at Isao.

"Manabu Isao. I have a family. I like my friends and stuff. My hobbies are training and stuff. I like my friends, training, and other stuff. I dislike anything annoying. My goal is to be a good ninja." Isao refused eye contact with any of them. Obviously not the most open of people.

"Iga Kichiro," the brunette began, knowing that he was the next. "I have a family as well. My hobby is training among other things. I like anything basically decent, like all people. I dislike anything basically bad, like all people. My goal is to excel as a ninja."

Takara's hands sunk into her hands, in grief that her teammates were unsociable and cold.

"Well, you three appear to be very interesting..." As if the woman had any right to talk... "Now, we're going to have a little test." Kaori smiled with a mixture of playfulness and sadism. "If you want to stay a ninja."

"WHAT?!" Isao and Taka screamed in unison. Kichiro perked up in interest. "We already passed the test!!"

"Are you kidding? Just performing a little ninjutsu won't make you a ninja. You have to have real skills. So it's my job to test that. Here." She handed each of them a list.

"I'm sending you all on a scavenger hunt. Be done before sunset or be prepared for another year at the academy." With that she was gone in a flurry of leaves. Obviously she wasn't as tired before as she let on.

Takara's list read:

_-A gift certificate for that Gonokima_

_-A small, red sparrow_

_-A box of fire crackers_

_-A gallon of sake_

_-Fiery Nights, the movie, on VHS_

_-My dry cleaning_

_-900 yen_

_-A Mirayoko chocolate cupcake_

_-Hatake Kakashi's Make Out Paradise book_

After a few moments of staring in shock at the utterly random list of objects, Takara broke the silence.

"Well, we might as well get started.

**A Few Moments Of Argument And Movement Later**

"Gorokima, I love this place! Their pork is the best! Can we get something?"

"Takara, no time for that. We have to go get a gift certificate somehow."

They went into the barbecue establishment, and saw Team Ten through the crowded restaurant.

"Ino-chan! Ino-chan!"

"No, Takara!" Isao insisted. "We have to keep on the job."

"Okay. I understand." As they passed the table, Ino and Takara made a bit of girly small talk, including one inside joke. They waved each other good bye, and Takara turned to see Kichiro politely asking a waitress if he could speak to the manager.

The lights suddenly went out.

Then, a spot light came on upon a humongous, burly man giving a "good guy" pose.

"Did someone ask for me?" Two call girls dazzled in kimonos behind him.

All the customers and gazed upon him freakishly, some dropping their tea or chopsticks, and the employees sighed at what was likely to have happened before.

"Yes, we'd like a gift certificate," Kichiro requested without break, to show he wasn't as weirded out as we was.

"Ho ho ho, you'd like a gift certificate, now would you? Tell me, how much money do you have for it?"

The three genin searched their pockets and came up with nothing.

"Then I can't give you anything, now can I?"

"Wait!" Isao begged. "Even though we don't have cash, can't we come to some compromise? Even if the amount on the card is low, can't you give us something? We'll do anything!"

"Hm..." the manager made exaggerated thinking poses. "A brilliant idea has struck me!! I will give you the gift certificate for free if you can defeat me in an arm wrestling match!!"

Isao, Kichiro, and Takara cheered and "yes"ed that they weren't going to have to return to the monotony of school, but were stopped when the manager raised his finger.

"But," he smiled viciously. "If you loose, than that girl you have there will have to come and work for me as a stand-in girl." The girls behind him "ooh"ed.

"NO WAY!! There is NO WAY I'd EVER--" Isao slapped his hand over Taka's mouth.

"We'll just have to beat him, then." Isao smirked.

The man pulled out a chair from a table and stratled it. He set his arm on the table, and Isao came up to meet him.

"Hit me with your best shot, all three of you!"

When their hands first met, Isao's was slammed to a few inches above the table top. He then built up his strength and started to push the manager's hand up. Kichiro came to help, and they were about to push him over, when the calls girls came and wrapped their arms around them.

"You don't want to waste time on THAT, now do you? We could have some fun..." They teased. Kichiro and Isao still tried to push, but having two skinny girls in the way was surprisingly making it harder.

Just then, all the manager's strength was relinquished, and his hand slammed down, as he burst into laughter.

Takara was behind him, tickling him.

In good humor, still laughing, the manager handed them a check, and the three made a run for it.

Crazy much?

**One Mad Dash And Bird Location Later**

"So that's it, huh?" Takara stared up to the top of the seemingly mile-high building in apathy. "So... who's gonna go get it?"

After a small, collective silence, both Isao and Kichiro outright pointed at Taka.

"Eh?! Why me??"

"'Cause you're a girl, and girls are skinnier and can climb better."

"What!? That's stupid! Guy's are supposed to do the work!!" Her eyes went frisbees again. "Wait-- no!! That's sexist-- I'm not sexist!! I can do anything you can do, and better!! I'll get that stinkin' bird!!" Flames of ambition flew from Taka's eyes as she jumped onto the building platform, and climbed upward.

A moment of silence passed between the two boys.

"Chick's really crazy, isn't she?" Isao looked up disdainfully at his teammate.

**One Climb Later**

"Nice birdie... Nice birdie... Stay still now..."

Takara, inches away from the single red sparrow, lunged.

**Inside The Top Window**

"Well then, Iruka, I understand you aren't glad that Kakashi is testing Naruto and his team, but what of Takara and her team? Kaori has never tested a group of genin before and I'm not even sure about it."

"Well, Isao is a bit of trouble, but Kichiro is more neutral. And I trust in Takara's ability to--"

Out the window, a blonde girl was seen flailing downward with a red bird in her grasp.

_The team doesn't get along to well!_

_But that can be left behind._

_'Cause now we're on a scavenger hunt!_

_And the bird's really hard to find._

**Author's Corner**

Lot's o' love, review if you wanna!!

**Shout Outs(regulars get nicknames)**

_Hikari-Kasumi: _Eh, not so much. But you got something right! Anko-chan and Kaori-chan got a relation... of sorts. You'll see. (NO GIRL ON GIRL, JUST A REMINDER! I wasn't hinting to that... XD Don't misinterpret, this girl is already looking for a special man... you'll see who.)

_Punk-chan: _Yeah but I'm putting the Shikamaruness on hold for a bit... though he's not gone yet.

_Domi-kun: _Well things are gonna get kinda silly... oh well. Scavenger hunt much?


	12. Princesses Gamble?

So far, Isao, Kichiro, and Takara had almost finished the scavenger hunt. It was approaching five o' clock, and they'd gotten the a cargo box of fire crackers, a gallon of sake, and the Fiery Nights pornographic movie by using genjutsu to appear as adults.

Doesn't sound too hard, does it?

You obviously don't know Takara well enough.

One very immature girl trying to put on the airs of an adult when there's a stray kitten about? Not so likely.

But the adult items were easy in comparison to finding the dry cleaning.

It was as though their crazy sensei, Kaori, KNEW that the dry cleaner's owner was mentally deranged.

How many times can you say, "No, I **won't **work for you!" or "No, I'm **not **that guy from that movie!"

Far from easy.

Now the list was mostly checked off, but the three genin-in-training hit a bump in the road.

"Nine hundred yen!? Is she KIDDING!!" Isao screamed, strangling the small paper. **(A/N: If I'm correct, that translates to 90) **"We're just kids!! We can't just cough up that kind of money!! What'll we do?!"

Takara's eyes gave off flames and she clenched her fist in ambition. "We'll gamble!!"

"EH!?" Isao turned and gave her a what-the-heck-are-you-talkin'-about-woman look. Kichiro went into deep thought.

"Oh, I was just kidding..." Taka lied.

"No, it's a good idea." Kichiro went through his thoughts very carefully.

"What!? We're kids, that's illegal for us?!"

Kichiro "sweat-dropped"(as she many call it). "We've already bought explosives, alcohol, and pornography. We can just use transformation jutsu."

"Yeah, there's no going back now." Taka's face went dark like that of a mad mafia boss for effect.

**At The Horse Racing Track**

The three genin looked upon "Lucky Day", a gray race horse, anxiously.

An explosive sounded and the horses were off!

Lucky Day was in the lead! No... No... now he's falling behind... now he's third... no, he could make it!... no, now he's last.

"Lucky! Go, Lucky! Go go go go!!" Takara cheered. Both the boys had too much dignity to do so.

The horse stopped running and sauntered over to the railing where the three genin were.

"No Lucky, go!!" The big tongue of the gray horse licked up Takara's face like Haunter to Charmander in the first generation. **(A/N: If you don't know what I'm talking about, you're clearly deprived.)**

The three went home and looted their couches and counters to come up with enough to make enough money to make even that small bet.

Miraculously, the rest of the horses were caught up because one man in the crowd had been drinking too much and threw up from the balcony onto the track, tripping the horse in the lead. The next horse crashed into the first, and the next, and the next, until they were nothing but a mess of tangled, thrashing legs.

Lucky Day eventually got along to the finish line. Eventually.

Now they were 450 yen short of the amount they needed, and needed to make one more bet.

As they read the boards for the next horse to bet on, Takara nearly had a seizure. She pointed her finger in an unidentifiable direction because it was shaking too much.

"What--What is it, Takara?" Isao and Kichiro looked at her with concern.

"P--P--P--**PRINCESS!!**" She screamed with her face convulsing.

They looked at the board, and sure enough, the name "Princess" was there.

"We HAVE to bet on Princess!! She won't fail us!!"

"What makes you so sure?" Isao doubted.

"We have to, have to, have to!!" Taka whined, wiggling her hips for effect.

"Fine, we'll bet on Princess," Isao said as Kichiro went to give the man at the counter the money, but the workers and everyone else around them(oddly all drunken men, surprise!) broke out laughing.

"Princess is on a fourty-five last place losing streak!!" the man chuckled.

"Four plus five equals nine, which it my lucky number!! This is a sign!! We'll win!!" Taka insisted.

The horse races were beginning and Isao went to get a funnel cake. Taka was bouncing on her feet and was close to falling over the rail.

The race began, and the horses were off! And sure enough, Princess tagged along in the back.

Through a mouth of funnel cake, Isao yelled, "Taka, we're gonna loose all our money! Great job, betting on Princess!! Just because it's the name Princess doesn't mean it's a real princess, and now we're not gonna become real genin!!"

When the white horse heard the word Princess, and smelt the powdered sugar of the funnel cake, she perked up.

Takara was hit with a brilliant idea!

She grabbed Isao and tucked him under her arm. She jumped onto the track and started running towards the finish line.

Princess, wanting the funnel cake Isao was struggling to hold, chased after them and unusual speeds.

Kichiro, seeing his need in the situation, used a transformation jutsu and appeared, when the smoke cleared, as a gorgeously decorated yellow haired, pink-highlighted female show horse. He (slash she) struck a pose, and the rest of the race horses, being male, got hearts in their eyes, and raced backwards towards him (slash her).

When the running Takara (carrying Isao) passed the finish line, she was tackled by Princess who proceeded to eat the deep fried treat and walked away as though nothing happened.

And to say the least, the crowd of angry men was less than pleased.

But they won! They had 900 yen, and they were well on their way to becoming genin. (But needless to say, it wasn't easy to get out of the stadium without trouble.

Though they weren't finished yet. They had to recover a very specific Mirayoko brand chocolate cupcake.

**After Searching Every Bakery In Town**

"What are we going to do?! UGH!!" Isao had thoroughly had enough of this strange day.

Not a single store in town had the Mirayoko cupcake they were looking for. Apparently they had been recalled after they had been dubbed too sweet for the public consumption. And Team Nine was so close!

"Um... you guys?..." Taka said after a while. Ever since she heard what they were looking for, she had been strangely quiet. "I--I--I-- think I can find us one..."

She half-heartedly lead them to her house, and into her kitchen. She opened the pantry door, took out a few boxes labeled for organization, and took a box from behind those.

She lifted the top, and oh, the glory!

Every sweet snack of every brand, of every flavor, of every kind! Candies, cupcakes, sweet cakes, sponge cakes, and all just marinating in raw sugar!!

. . . Sweet tooth much?

Both the boys were astounded.

"Where-- Where did you get all this stuff!?" Isao managed out.

"Well, I have a stash. And... this is the last Mirayoko chocolate cupcake the people have... I don't know if I can..."

"Takara." Kichiro said, earning her attention. "This is for our careers as ninja. It means we have to make sacrifice."

"Ki--Kichiro--" Taka stuttered, getting teary eyed. "You're right!!" Flames once again ignited in her eyes, shaking away the moisture.

"Come on, you guys!" She cheered. "We have a book to steal!"

**Once Copy-Nin Locating Later**

Team Nine had scanned the village, ninja style, and found the infamous copy ninja, himself, eating ramen with Team Seven.

_'Just my luck,' _Takara thought. _'He's THEIR sensei!!'_

They'd made various attempts to try and steal it already, many having to with genjutsu as beautiful women. None of which worked.

"What're we gonna do?" Isao whispered to Kichiro, not noticing that Takara was missing from their spying location. Wait, she was down talking to Kakashi!!

Before they could try to recover the situation, she was speaking to him.

"Excuse me, Hatake Kakashi?" She asked shyly, cringing when the rest of the team turned to look at her. "Can I ask a favor?"

He smiled, making his eyes resemble upside down U's. "Sure." Normally Kakashi wouldn't have been so open to say yes to these things(it might have required effort), but he thought the look that cold Sasuke gave this girl held interest he wouldn't regularly give.

Suddenly, two boys came up behind her, smiling broad, forced smiles, and tugged on her ears.

"Hehe, well-- uh--" they both stuttered.

"No need to hide it. I've seen you were here for the last fifteen minutes." Kakashi smiled wider at their distressed expressions.

"Well, we'd like to-- borrow your book." Kakashi's good humor left him.

"No, I can't do that."

"Please?" Taka begged.

"No. What do you need it for--"

"Please, Kakashi-senpai?" Kaori playfully asked as she placed her hands and chin on Takara's head.

"Why we you need that?" he asked, as equally playful. No one saw him blush behind his mask.

"Well, I've had my students assemble all the elements of the perfect date."

All the mouths of Team Nine dropped to the floor.

"WHAT?!" They all pardoned in unison. Explosives?! Porn movie?! A single cupcake!? What did this woman have in mind?!

"Oh, chill out. You all pass." The three sighed in relief. "So, what do you say, Hatake, is it a date?"

He smirked. "Of course."

The two walked away, smugly, and hand in hand.

Takara's eyes were spilling over with tears of joy.

"OH. MY. GOSH!!" She bellowed to the heavens. "We're genin now!! We're really, official, genin!! Oh, Issi-kun, Kichi-kun, we did it!!" She wrapped her arms around their shoulders.

" 'Issi-kun'? "

" 'Kichi-kun'? " They both questioned with raised eyebrows.

"Hm? Oh, yeah!! That's your names now!! I love giving nicknames!!" The two boys happily "okay"'d.

"Now come on, you guys, let's go to the dumpling shop, I'm hungry and I've got a gift card!"

The three friends bantered off into the sunset.

Behind them, two boys remembered when _they _had nicknames.

_Trying so hard to find everything,_

_The three find that they're friends._

_But there are two boys who can't put up,_

_And jealousy the heart bends._

**Author's Corner**

I kind of bent towards humor(or I tried XD) in this one. I wish I could draw, so I could illustrate the expressions I imagined for all of them. Review and support Taka's future as a ninja. And the boys' future in that. ;

**Shout Outs**

_Claamchowder: _Eh, I sort of had humor in this one. Hope I didn't bore you. My main focus in this story isn't comedy, really, it's more romance-friendship-drama-personal growth-hurt-comfort. This chapter was a bit filler-esque, but whatever. Don't flame me for it. Oh, and friends for sure!! puts cupcake in hand And I know what you mean. I get SO BORED waiting for my stories to come out.

_Hikari-chan: _Totally! Clumsy much? Wait a minute... dawns on self that talks like a prep Oh... no... /0o0\

_Domi-kun: _I was tempted to make Takara strong enough to miraculously beat the guy, but I fear Mary Sue-ism. No matter how subtle. And don't worry, though I didn't put it, Kichiro saved Taka while she was falling. Ooooh, ya!! Cookie!! Thanksyou!! inhales cookie

_Punk-chan: _Bet you weren't suspecting Kaori to be into Kakashi, right? That's my birthday present to you! Happy b-day! LOL Never mind, I'm just being stupid.


	13. Where Consolation Meets Constellations

Team nine had been together for six weeks or so. They had become fantastic friends, and seen the inner wealth in each other.

They trained, ate out, accomplished missions(many D, and two C-ranked), and put up with each other. Kichiro and Isao had come to see Takara as the little sister they needed to protect(and honestly people, she needs protection). Takara had come to see the boys as her older brothers, in turn.

Takara was proud in herself that she accomplished making such great friends. "_But as she still wished she'd been placed with Ino or Hinata, or Sasuke or Naruto-- what?" _She stopped as she was walking home from another day of missions.

_"Why did I think that? No, I don't want to be paired with them, who so cruelly abandoned me!"_

_"Okay, so it wasn't so dramatic as I'm thinking. But still!"_

_"And Neji-- what about Neji? What happened with us? I-- NO! No remembering that stuff. I'm a full-fledged shinobi now and none of that matters! I have a new life now! But still I wish-- no!! Wait... what am I doing?" _Takara stopped herself because she didn't realize she was walking in circles.

On a tower not too far away, a clear-eyed Hyuga beheld the circling brown-eyed girl.

He remembered when there was a time when he could go to her in a situation like this and critically, yet ever so lovingly, tell her how unsafe and unlike a ninja it was to aimlessly walk around with her guard down.

But he couldn't.

I was because his damned uncle and the Hyuga Main Branch Council decided she distracted him from his purpose.

Needless to say, at the time, he fought it, but that only taught him how much a burden the curse mark was.

And that he could never defeat his destiny.

He decided that his fate was set for him and that it was no use fighting it.

He glowered at the ground as he made his way away from the tower and away from the agonizing memory he unearthed after so long.

. . . Had it really been so long?

**The Next Morning**

Long after light met the sky the next day, Taka rolled out of bed. Literally, onto the floor.

She got over herself and went out into her day.

Her team had just recently decided to go out for the Chunin Exams. Takara had been training hard and was preparing herself with all the needed gear. But could she really be ready? She wasn't sure.

While she was walking the village and pondering these things so heavy heartedly, she heard squabbling and screaming. Some how she knew it had to do with Naruto. . .

And yet she went that way anyway.

She found, down an open alley-path way, Sakura walking away haughtily from a bashed Naruto and Konohamaru. Two other children, and boy and a girl, were there with them. (in all likeliness, Konohamaru's friends)

Konohamaru said something, probably insulting, about Sakura, and she stopped in her angry tracks. She turned and faced him like the spinning head of a zombie doll. (Needless to say, Takara was frightened.)

The four victims tried to run off, but Sakura had run fast after them.

Little Konohamaru, in the lead, ran into someone who Taka had not seen there before.

He wore the strangest of clothing and had a mummy-thing on his back. Behind him was a girl in equally odd clothing and a case on her back. Both looked significantly older (and stronger) than Takara, she noticed.

Taka came towards the few in case Naruto and his friends needed back up. (and maybe Sakura, too)

"That hurts," he stated. It didn't seem like a complaint, but more of an excuse for something he was about to do.

In what seemed like a second, so no one could stop it, the boy(slash man) was holding Konohamaru by the gruff of his shirt.

"That hurt, brat." His smile, while disdainful, was still quite teasing. A possible vendetta against the Leaf? They had the Sand insignia.

"Stop it, we're going to get scolded later," she warned, but it seemed like she didn't really care.

"I'm sorry, I was joking around, so. . ." Sakura tried with fail to make amends.

"Hey! Let go of that hand!" Naruto, brave as ever!

The boy just smirked. "But I want to play around before some noisy people come."

"Let go!" the little brunette boy ordered. Taka gasped and saw that the boy also had a hold on Konohamaru's neck.

"Yeah, come on! Let go of him!" Takara nearly begged. Her Leaf comrades turned to see her, surprised at her presence.

The boy tightened his grip. "You energetic little kid. . ."

Naruto let his anger out and charged the foreign boy, who got a look in his eyes that scared Taka. He made some signs, she noticed, with his fingers, and Naruto tripped and fell. Some strange jutsu. . .

"What was that!?" Naruto looked up from the ground.

"Konoha's genins are weak," the Sand boy decided. Takara took this as a personal threat.

The little boy's friends both called out to him in despair.

"Hey, if you don't let go of him, you're going to get it from me, you idiot!" Naruto challenged, and Taka smiled inwardly, warmly recalling when he told her he'd be a hero one day, all those many times.

But she quickly dismissed the thought.

Sakura grabbed Naruto in a headlock and whispered to him, probably something like "shut up".

"You piss me off. I hate short people, anyway. And you're so impertinent for someone younger than me," he resolved menacingly. "It makes me want to break you." Takara was slowly beginning to break out her kunai, deciding that physical negotiations would be more effective than verbal ones.

The girl said something about not being involved with it with an apathy.

"After this short kid, the short kid over there is next," the (dubbed by Taka) evil teen murmured. He pulled back his fist to punch, but he dropped Konohamaru.

A pebble had seemed to have been thrown hard and hit his arm.

Uchiha Sasuke sat tossing another pebble up and down in his hand. Sakura screamed a his name in adoration.

"Another kid that pisses me off. . . " the boy growled.

Sasuke crushed the stone in his hand. "Get lost."

Taka grinned that even though he might be cold and hurtful, Sasuke was always dependable.

Konohamaru told Naruto he wasn't cool and Taka was glad to be rid of the intense situation-- that everyone could be happy.

"Are you all right, Konohamaru-san?" Takara asked, but didn't listen to his answer, because Kankuro, as she had learned from the girl his name was, was stirring up and asking Sasuke for a fight, but he was stopped in his tracks.

"Kankuro, stop." It was a heavy voice, and a slightly scary voice, but it had a handsome drawl to it. "You're a disgrace to our village."

A boy no one had noticed before was hanging from the tree where Sasuke sat. How long had he been there? Takara didn't care. She just didn't want him to leave.

No, he didn't have any directly attracting qualities like Sasuke, but there was some to him-- something Takara couldn't disregard.

His hair was fiery, cherry red, and his eyes-- that was it. His eyes were ice blue, like a deep winter that had never known spring.

Everyone was taken aback by his sudden presence.

"Ga-Gaara. . ."

_"Gaara. . ." _Taka went over the word in her mind. She had a feeling it would not soon be leaving there.

"Why do you think we came all the way here to Konoha?" Gaara's words were coated in ice but for some strange reason Taka wouldn't except that. She didn't like cold people but something about Gaara just hinted an underlying warmth.

"Listen, Gaara--" Gaara had Kankuro stuttering. "These guys started it."

"Shut up," he ordered. "I'll kill you."

It was an utterly intense moment, and Taka wanted to intervene so badly, but she was frozen by Gaara's words. What did he mean? Was he serious? He couldn't be.

Just like-- some beast, like some beast he was. Some beast trapped by loneliness and sin. That seemed to fit Gaara.

"I was at fault. I'm sorry, I'm really sorry." This brave guy? Apologizing?

"Excuse us." Gaara pardoned, though it seemed unlike him. Though it showed little, Takara meekly nodded.

Sasuke and Gaara exchanged glances Taka couldn't read and Gaara disappeared into-- sand?

_"Well, they're from the Sand Village," _she resolved.

As the three left, Takara felt into a trance. She wondered about Gaara. What was a truly like? A real mystery, for sure.

He, Sasuke, and Naruto(and Sakura, as well?) spoke about the Chunin Exams, though Taka wasn't listening to hear it.

"Gaara. . ." She tasted it aloud when they all were gone.

**After A Day Of Trivial Training And Chores**

During the battle of boredom while trying to fall asleep, Takara decided it useless to stare up at the ceiling when she wasn't sleepy. She went out on a walk, and ended up going out much farther than she expected.

"Where am I?" she asked herself. She barely recognized this part of town. She did, however, recognize the icy blue eyes fixated on her from atop the building nearby.

There was nothing deep about them at first glance; you really had to dig deep into his eyes of stone to see what Taka thought was so beautiful, though she herself didn't know why she thought so.

"G--Gaara-san, is that you?" As if she didn't know.

There was no answer so Takara jumped onto the building towards him.

"Your name is Gaara, right?" She tried hard to talk to him, to get him to say something. He was staring out at nothing, but turned his gaze slightly on her.

"What is it you want?" he hissed.

"May I watch the stars with you? It's a nice night out, isn't it?"

She didn't get a response. Only a very cautious boy resentfully watching her out of the corner of his eye.

"It sure is quiet out here in the dark. . . Why is it you're out here, are you an insomniac? I can tell from your eyes. . ."

He remained silent.

"Do you know the constellations?" She didn't wait for an answer. "That's Orion. There in his heel is Rigel. The Romans were the ones who gave them the names. Do you know the stories? They're like fairy tales. The first one that comes to mind is the story of Odysseus. . ."

Gaara's confusion swirled in his thoughts. What did this girl want with him? Well, it made sense. This was a town where no one knew him and was yet to fear him.

She would just have to learn what he was.

Well, maybe after her story.

_Love can be a peculiar thing_

_And it's hard to comprehend_

_But stars can make situations just right_

_To put loneliness to an end_

**Author's Corner**

**I went through so many situations in my head to find one where Gaara didn't kill Takara. I'm glad I found one. I didn't want the story to end yet. : **

**Review if you love Gaara-kun!**

**Shout Outs**

_Hikari-chan: _Yeah but normally OCs bore people. : P

_Domi-kun: _Dang boi, you got way better ideas than me. And I love that you gave me Kichiro 'cause I got a bunch of ideas for him. : And no, cookies are for readers. I call all the cupcakes.

_Claam-kun: _NO! CUPCAKE! Wait-- let it go, Kitty, let it go. Tanks you. :

_Arch-chan: _Well we'll have to wait for Shika-kun 'cause it's Gaara-kun's turn. Oooh! Dancing! dances with

_Arch-chan: _No, I didn't put it, but actually Kichi-kun caught her.

_Arch-chan: _Sasuke nor Naruto has exactly gotten over Taka-chan... wink wink. :

_Punk-chan: _Thanks and love! I do like smores. : I know I've been slow updating, ah.


	14. Chunin Exam Distractions

A routine had been set. Every night, Takara would come to the guest condominium where Gaara was staying and sit on the roof with him, talking nonstop.

He didn't mind her talking. He actually heard some things he didn't abhor, and though his mind didn't know it, in his heart of hearts, he enjoyed having the company of someone, specifically Takara.

But still, every night when Taka came to see him, he vowed throughout their one sided conversation that he'd kill her when she finished. Somehow, strangely, he never did. This confused and made him want to kill her more.

But he couldn't.

Neither of them noticed, but each night, Taka scooted closer and closer to Gaara. Sometimes she even got answers from him, though they were all monosyllabic.

On the fourth night, she fell asleep on the roof.

Gaara, concerned about what to do, returned her to the place she indicated as her house. And also, he did not kill her, though he told himself he would. He just laid her down on the bed he presumed to be hers, in the house that seemed to be hers, and watched her for a bit.

Takara was quite a gorgeous girl but not in a way that could be shown with her utter lack of grace.

Gaara was still drawn to her in a way that sickened him.

He watched her sleeping face, her mouth slightly ajar, her eyes closed, her ponytailed hair she let lose sprawled over the pillow, and she, lightly snoring.

It wasn't long into his gazing before Taka turned her head around. Clearly, as anyone could tell, she was a restless sleeper, tossing and turning about. Gaara didn't mind it, though.

One turn, however, and Takara flopped out of bed and onto the carpeted floor.

Gaara swore in his mind and picked up the groggy, stirring girl to put her back in her bed. She twisted and grunted a bit before returning to slumber.

Reluctantly, Gaara left, finding abnormality in his emotions.

_"What is this feeling? . . ."_

**The Next Day**

Takara stood, leaning on the concrete wall with her team, over aware of each and every one of her actions and movements. Team Ten found its place beside them, followed by Team Eight.

Taka would have gladly been chatting away with Ino and Hinata, but the dozens of eyes staring down the "rookies" made her fluster and shiver, though she didn't show it. They couldn't show weakness.

Abruptly, Naruto burst in, his team behind him. The rest of their previous classmates went to greet them(though admittedly, not in the kindest matter). Team Nine stood their ground.

After commotion with them that drew seething and unneeded attention from the more experienced shinobi, a man in an intimidating black cloak, obviously the proctor, came and orchestrated the class.

_"Say what?! Written test?! I heard nothing about this!! I thought I was done with tests when I graduated!" _Takara cursed all things intelligent in her mind and proceeded to the written exam.

In actuality, Taka was far from stupid at neared the top of class in intelligence. Not to mention, she spent hours studying before the Chunin Exam beginning to insure her success.

However, laziness topped with utter lack of common sense kept her far from ever being labeled as "smart girl".

The first few questions came easy, being just common ninja situations that required some strategy planning. The rest were harder and required some guessing because all things numerical made Taka's brain hurt.

Easy enough, though.

She could see also that Kichiro had gotten it, but Isao was struggling at the first question. Wait...

_"Wait a minute, what is everyone doing?! They're all cheating!! He said clearly we're not supposed to cheat! We have to collect info and stuff... or something... wait, then wouldn't it be easier to cheat? Isn't that kind of what he told us to do?" _Takara lingered ever so close to the truth. _"Nah, couldn't be."_

Every few moments a number was called out, pointing out the cheater.

"Time's up! Now, for number 10..." The proctor chuckled. "This is the final and most important question. If you don't answer it correctly, you fail. But not only to you fail, you're dropped from the program! Permanently! That you'll stay a genin forever."

Silent chaos immediately ensued. Well, not so silent. Mumbles of grief passed from shinobi to shinobi. Seats were shuffled in and eyes were filled with horror.

Figures flashed through Taka's thoughts: Isao, Kichiro, and everyone else she cared about. Was this a risk worth taking?

She looked back on Kichiro, who gave her a strong, reassuring nod. He gave Isao the same. Isao swallowed hard and nodded back.

Takara felt like crying tears of joy. Dramatic, yes, and of course she really wouldn't, but she knew she had her team mates to stand with and she knew she wouldn't back down.

_"Love." _That's what Taka decided it was. She couldn't love her friendsmore. Than she worried about her other loved ones: Hinata, Ino, Gaara, Sasuke, Naruto, and Neji. . . And that time she didn't bother to correct herself.

But Naruto-- he began to raise his hand.

_"No, Naruto, don't!!" _Taka fought him in her head. It wasn't like him-- he couldn't-- no-- he couldn't! _"Oh, Naruto-kun, please! You can't! You just, can't! I don't want to be part of this if you're not here!"_

Takara's eyes widened in horror as her latest thought came to her attention.

Naruto, thankfully, slammed his hand down onto the desk and made a speech about how he wouldn't give up(ever so like him), but the thought had been thought.

Taka forced herself to ignore it with all the force she could muster.

Other teams gave up, and the proctor revealed that the tenth question was the question of giving up or not. Then he gave a speech about how ninjas needed to collect information, but Taka wasn't listening to it at all.

Her thoughts were preoccupied with her emotions, a rather dangerous thing for a shinobi to do, especially in a room full of other shinobi.

But then again, she was too preoccupied to realize.

(And though she didn't know it, she wasn't the only one with her feelings on her mind. This was proved by the a pairs of deep ebony, pale white, ice blue, and honey brown eyes that carefully examined each of Taka's movements and guessed at her thoughts.)

And Naruto just cheered.

_He's longed for years to feel people near._

_In this, irony is bitter._

_Because he's not alone in loving her!_

_But for sure, he isn't a quitter._

**Author's Corner**

**My, the poems are getting worse and worse, aren't they? Review and help my poetic stump. :)**

**Shout Outs**

_Punk-chan: _Let's hope Taka doesn't make Gaara mad. And Shika will be back. In fact, they're all here to stay. And der, this is an update. JK! : And thank you!


	15. Possible Boyfriend If She Lives!

"You're kidding, right?" Shikamaru raised his eyebrows in disbelief as he wandered through the Forest of Death, keeping alert to possible attack, but keeping up his lazy facade.

"No. Poor girl's never had a boyfriend." Ino shrugged and sighed at her friend's lack of romantic experience.

"I don't believe it." Shikamaru was more than skeptical that a girl like Takara didn't have a boyfriend, let alone that she _never _had one.

"It's the truth. I don't know why though, she's got plenty of boys after her. She's just clueless to them. I mean, she'd be great with any of the boys who like her, like Daichi, or Katsu, or Makoto, or-- I think Kuro had a thing for her. And Akihiko said he thought she was pretty-- and Eiji's been eyeing her, too... Hm..."

"Tch." He dismissed his hopeful thoughts and turned his complete attention to finding his other teammate who had slipped away to snack.

He thought if she had no experience with boys she wouldn't be objective to him-- no, he dismissed the thought once again.

"Oh Shikamaru..." Ino smiled slyly, scaring Shikamaru. "You like her don't you?"

"No way." He turned his head away from her so she wouldn't see his face and know he was lying. Wait-- he wasn't lying! He didn't like her. Did he?

"I can tell a liar from a mile away." She smirked as a plot formed in her head. She poked his arm teasingly. "If you like Taka, maybe I can get her together with you."

Shikamaru perked up. That was impossible, right? No "popular"(as Ino phrased it) girl like her would go out with an "unpopular"(Ino once again) guy like him.

"You just have to prove to me that you'd make a good boyfriend for her. That means you have to show perfect boyfriend behavior. You have to agree with everything I say and do whatever I want you to do," she spurted it cockily as though it had already been decided.

"Nice try. You just want me to obey."

She placed her hands on her hips. "Sheesh, Shikamaru, I try to do something nice for you and you turn me down." She teased him, thinking half that she wanted to help her friend and half that she wanted to abuse her teammate. "Don't you like Taka-chan?"

"Hey, Choji! Come down from there!" Shikamaru ignored Ino's discovering of the truth. Choji sat up in a tree happily snacking away. Goodness knows how the less than fit boy got up there.

"Fine, Shikamaru, but if it makes a difference, I think I've got her looking at you and time or two."

He pretended not to hear, just like he pretended not to care.

**Not Too Short A Distance Away**

Takara had a habit or making lists. Sometimes she wrote them down. In fact, back home, she kept a journal at her house, where she kept track of every list she had ever made, from her first, 15 Reasons I Don't Want To Start School Tomorrow, to the latest, 40 Reasons Gaara-kun Is Cool.

Right then, she wished she'd brought that journal because she was already on reason 57 of why she hated the Forest of Death, that being that it had tons of scary, huge bugs!

Isao grinned cockily into the distance and pinched his chin in thought.

"I've already gotten a few strategies planned out. . ."

"Come on, Issi-kun. We all know you can't strategize. You're totally baka!" Taka put her hands on her hips and lectured her silly little teammate.

"Like you're one to talk!" he angrily sputtered.

"No, Taka-chan, let him talk." Taka gave Kichiro an odd look. He regularly agreed that Isao was less than a strategist, so this was odd of him.

"Thanks, Kichiro. Anyway--" Isao went off to spout out poorly planned strategies. Takara gave Kichiro an odd look, but he was staring around.

"Let's go find a river you guys, I'm thirsty." He looked behind him once, and they all took off.

The team of ready, shinobi murderers Kichiro pretended not to notice trailed behind them, blood lust fueling their lunges from branch to branch.

_Poor Taka, never had a date._

_But winds of change are blowing in!_

_Does Ino really not know about Taka's "friends"?_

_She's never had a boyfriend, but a princess she's been._

**Author's Corner**

**I know I'm late updating, and I'll make it up to you! I'm trying to write a chapter a day and I'm keeping track of those I've skipped. I'll write 'em! I will! REVIEWING MAKES ME HAPPY AND MAKES ME UPDATE FASTER! ;D**

**Shout Outs**

_Punk-chan: _Thanks you! I'm afraid of OCCness. . . TTTT

_Claam-kun: _Oooh! I like rings! You stay Claam-kun now. And who doesn't love Gaara-kun?

_Domi-kun: _Sooooo sorry! Update I will! This is the farthest I've ever gone on a story, and I'm not gonna stop 'til it's finished! And I like da chocolate cupcake!! And no, Taka's not gonna be some uber strong freakazoid who became Chunin, too. Shika stays only.

_Domi-kun: _Remember the talking to him bits? And don't worry, she'll talk to him more and they'll grow on each other. But right now she's still on Gaara-kun. And I can wait for cupcakes. :

_Arch-chan: _Chill, I'm only gonna have her hit five, and there's a reason for that, I'll explain that in a later Author's Corner.

_Arch-chan: _Oh, you know it! And she's not uber strong, so we don't know if she'll pass the exam or not. Hoshizzle, foreshadowing!

_Hikari-chan: _Neither can I! JK, I know what's gonna happen. . . hehe. . .

_Punk-chan: _Eh, he's not exactly the type to decide NOT to kill someone. Oh well! He'll learn someday. . .

_Claam-kun: _YUSH! GAARA-KUN IS DA BEST!! Oh, Shika and Naru, too, you're right, but Shino and Kankuro and Kiba don't get any Taka. . . Sorry. . .


	16. Sexy Jutsu: The Inspiration?

Youji sharpened his kunai with another one. He grinned, flashing his surprisingly sharp canines.

"I call the stupid one. Morons like him just piss me off."

"Heh!" Chitose bent his cold, vacant grimace into a bone-chilling smile. "I wanna waste that Kichiro. He's quiet and acts cool. I'll skin his ass!"

"What about the girl? Which one of us is gonna take out the girl?" Iku nagged with his hands on his hips, ever the downer. "I don't want to."

"We don't have to kill her. Just rough her up a bit, get her out of the way," Chitose decided, agreeing that it was unfit of their honorable Rain shinobi selves to dispatch a girl.

"Tch. You guys are all business. Can't we have some fun with the girl? She was freaking hot," Youji, more than a little bit of a pervert, went off into thoughts unfit of a gentleman. But then again, he wasn't one. Not at all.

"Sounds good to me. . ." Chitose felt free to unleash his inner deviant around Youji.

"If you jerks wanna get anything done, we'd better get going," Iku carped.

And with ninja swiftness, they vanished from their casual positions, and were off, each with smug smirk on their faces. For they knew exactly where their prey went to roost.

**In A Spectacular Scene, Encrusted With Golden, Shimmering Sunlight By A Shallow, Crystalline Stream**

Team Chitose came upon a sight they less than expected, to say the least.

A breathtaking girl with sopping wet hair, darkened to brunette by the water, down her to the rim of her shoulder blade. She held her clothing she had been wearing in front of her, as though she were about to change.

Her flaxen brown eyes shone spectacularly like honey-browned suns in the given light. Her body, only giving hints from behind the clothing, still aroused the boys' imaginations.

Each of the once-proud Rain-nin flustered furiously and gave goofy, graceless smiles. Blood shout like bottle rockets out of their noses.

When she caught sight of them, she smiled plasticly, though they didn't notice that it was obviously forced. Had they been closer to her, they would see the rapid twitch her eyebrow was performing. They weren't, however, and still saw the invisible flower petals falling behind her head.

Quickly wiping the blood trickling down his face on his sleeve, Youji, his eyes still wide and wild and his conscious in a degenerate trance, ran out to the girl.

Just when he was about to grab her in a place young ladies dislike to be grabbed, a forcefully enraged elbow struck his head, knocking him way far out.

Chitose and Iku came out of their dazes, but not in time to escape being stomped on by Kichiro, who came out of a tree branch above them and smashed his feet onto their heads.

The three passed out perverts were laid animatedly smoking into a pile by Isao, who dusted off his hands and slammed his hands over his eyes, squealing womanishly when he realize Taka was nearly naked.

"Go put your clothes on!!" He shooed her off with her hand.

"Of course I will. What's the matter, am I revolting or something?" Taka slid her fitted beige cargo pants back over her underclothes that she was still wearing.

"Well, yeah!" Isao fought her childishly. Kichiro stood behind him with his back turned to Takara, and his eyes anywhere but near her.

"Excuse me!!" Taka's eyes went saucer-size and her nostrils flared, as she made a little pikey-peg out of her hot pink tank top she was trying to get on.

"Taka, put your clothes on already." Kichiro sighed. It's not that you're ugly, but it's like seeing your mom naked."

"That's. . . endearing." Takara honestly wasn't sure whether to feel mom-ish or to feel touched that they saw her that way. She decided just to get changed.

Once she slipped on and zipped up her chest jacket, that looked like a beige Chunin vest that ended above her abdomen, she shook her hair dry, put it into a ponytail, and slid on her tan lace-up Greco-Roman sandals.

Isao and Kichiro went through their victims' bags, finding various supplies for their use and, at last, a scroll!

"What luck! A Heaven Scroll!" Isao cheered. Kichiro slapped his hands over his teammate's mouth.

"Shut up, Issi-kun! We've got to stay quiet or someone'll try and take it," she hissed, with her finger to her lips like a school teacher trying to get a little child to be silent.

Isao "hmph"ed and crossed his arms stubbornly, but Kichiro and Taka ignored him and raided the rest of the luggage.

Luckily, Taka found paper to write her lists down on. She started her list she kept secret from the boys with the first reason she could think of that she didn't like the Forest of Death:

_Gaara-kun isn't here._

_Missing the beast?_

_He won't be gone for long._

_Wonder what he'd think if he knew_

_What those Rain punks did wrong!_

**Author's Corner**

**The reason for this entire story was to demonstrate my crushes on the Naruto boys, and now that I've gotten into, it's much more than that. So review(reasonless --')!! **


	17. Shame! Liars, Tramps, And Eavesdroppers!

When Team Nine figured out the mystery of the Heaven and Earth scrolls, and opened them, they unleashed their "beloved" sensei, Kaori. As soon as she appeared from underneath the cover of smoke, she was trapped in a dead-lock hug by ever-bubbly Taka.

"Kaoriri-sensei!!" Takara hugged her less than enthusiastic teacher. "I missed you so much!!"

"Taka, I've only been away from you for four days." Kaori stood up straight and tall as though she weren't affected by the killer hug. Kichiro and Isao wondered how she survived it, for they had each been engaged in similar situations before and nearly survived. They decided Jonin were stronger than they, but still. What an inhuman hug. . .

"You won't believe all the stuff that happened! It was so boring and tiring getting in the forest! And scary, too! You wouldn't believe the bugs! They were like, huger then me!" Takara spread her arms out to demonstrate the size.

"Yeah, and you won't believe what we did to get a scroll!" Isao boomed. Takara made a jerk of her head, as her she had been struck with a pen in the neck.

She quickly took Isao and Kichiro by their forearms and pulled them to the corner of the cement room.

"I thought we had an agreement." He eyes seemed to glow black underneath, and instead of saucers, her eyes resembled rectangular white boxes. "You tell NO ONE of the shameful event which occurred on that dark day. . ." She spoke as though they were dealing with a mass murder conspiracy.

The two boys just swallowed hard. "Well-- I thought Kaori-sensei didn't count as one to keep secrets from," Isao mumbled, trying to make an excuse.

"Keeping secrets from me? Hm?" The red-brunette sensei appeared behind their huddle. "You know I don't like that."

"It's n-nothing, Kaori-sensei."

Kaori gave her a skeptical look. "You know I don't like to be to lied to or left out."

"Eh. . ." Horror crept onto Takara's expression and Kaori's rage bubbled. Just when the three thought that they'd how to confess, they were saved by the bell. Er-- rather, the copy-nin.

"Kaori, sorry I'm late. I--" Kakashi began to excuse himself, but Kaori appeared next to him and punched his head.

"You said you'd be here TWO HOURS AGO!! You jerk, I oughta beat the pulp outta you!"

"Uh-- as I was about to say, I dropped by the Yamanaka Flower Shop to get you these." Kakashi rubbed the sore on the back of his took a bouquet of tiger lilies from behind his back.

"Oh, Kakashi-kun!" Kaori transformed into an entirely different person at sight of the blossoms. "I'm so sorry!" She hugged and patted him on the head like a little five-year-old boy. Then she snaked her arms around his waist in a method you wouldn't to a five-year-old boy. "I'll make it up to you. . ."

Kakashi smirked and as the two walked away, but when Kaori had her back turned, Kakashi turned and gave the three a wink.

"Those tiger lilies were the ones we saw in the forest, right?" Isao whispered with her hand cupped around her mouth. "He probably grabbed some from the forest on the way here."

"But he still saved me," Taka added. "You guys tell no one about this, capeesh? Not even Kaori-sensei. I went way below my standards to get a scroll for us, and the least you can do is be quiet about my disgraceful sacrifice."

Isao stuck his hands in his pockets. "Geez, you talk about it as though you did something sexual. All you did was show off a little. Don't make such a big deal about it."

Kichiro swiftly took ten steps back with a how-could-you-be-so-stupid look on his face.

"You. . . You. . ." Taka was at a loss for words. Then, as though seven thousand bottle rockets went off inside of her, she went into sputtering, thrashing rage.

"HOW DARE YOU?? I KILL OFF MY DIGNITY AND MY SELF RESPECT AND THIS IS HOW YOU THANK ME?! I KNOCK YOUR BLOCK OFF, BLOCKHEAD! THAT'S WHAT YOU ARE, A BLOCKHEAD! BLOCKHEAD-KUN! THAT'S YOUR NAME NOW! BLOCKHEAD-KUN! BLOCKHEAD-KUN, BLOCKHEAD-KUN, BLOCKHEAD-KUN!!" As Takara followed more and more into her angry torrent, Kichiro sighed at his teammate's usual antics.

He agreed and wasn't too fond of the idea of his most sister-like figure nearly exposing herself to pig-headed Rain shinobi, but they needed a scroll, and he didn't want to have to use his jutsu around his friends.

He cringed. He never wanted to show his jutsu to his friends. It was powerful, yes, extremely powerful. But he was afraid. . . more than afraid of what they'd think.

Kichiro then noticed out of the corner of his eye, while his friends continued to fight(and Isao continued to lose), that they were being watched. A group of Sand ninja, he deciphered.

Gaara saw the peculiar girl. He wondered what her sacrifice had been. . .

_The Dragon is weary with his secret_

_The secrets are burning where they lay_

_Can Princess and the Dog see the truth?_

_But then, will Beast's rose turn gray?_

**Author's Corner**

FYI people, you should pay attention to the chapter names and poems because that's where the foreshadowing lies. . . BUM BUM BUM. Give me reviews and I give you cupcakes. Here, take one. -- D Yes. That's what a cupcake looks like.

**Shout Outs**

_vallin55amaya: _That'd be a negative, I've never heard of Kilala Princess before. And thanks you, I try. ;

_Domi-kun: _Well, Kichiro-kun is the most competent. And looks like Shika-kun has finally found some motivation! But he's not going to make his move. . . we all know it. Or will he?! GASP! Oh, and thank you. cupcake magically disappears, or so it seems

_Domi-kun: _Oh, of course! We can't let our boys be lonely, now can we? And I'll do my best to feed that addiction of yours. I've got a few chapters I need to write, and I'll be on vacation so I've got plenty of time to do it.

_Hikari-chan: _Not the smartest girl, is she? And YUSH! We've got a shot at the pre-lims! Or do we? OH MY!!

_Punk-chan: _Yes, all powerful writer will decide Gaara-kun's fate. Poor boy. . .


	18. Letting Kids Duke It Out

The Hokage gave a speech on the real reason behind the Chunin Exams. This was that it was to strengthen the bonds between villages and to bring respect upon the champion's village.

Though most of the ninja found it as trivial, it put unneeded pressure on Takara. Could she defeat whoever she was chosen to fight with? She could already think of many people she wouldn't want to fight. There was no way she could win on strength alone. . .

She'd have to use her family's technique.

The first match was between Prince-- er, rather, Sasuke, and some miscellaneous Leaf ninja that Taka was suspicious of. He had a mask, dark glasses, and an eerie feeling about him.

Takara decided to be rooting for Sasuke, but of course she wouldn't aloud. Ino would certainly get mad at her. But even to decide that she wanted Sasuke to win was hard. Of course she wanted her fellow rookie to be accepted further into the exams, but Sasuke was someone that had hurt her as a child for reasons she was barely able to understand. But still. . . she could no longer deny that the child who felt something(whatever that thing might have been) for him.

She decided it was best not to share this thought with Ino.

The fight went on, scaring Takara more than a few times, because she was so afraid that Sasuke would become seriously hurt. She watched many times as he came close to serious damage.

He had already been damaged before his battle! It wasn't fair, Taka decided. If she had met him the forest somewhere before the Prelims, she could have used some medicine or medical ninjutsu to heal him, and it wouldn't have terrified Taka so much.

Every time the anonymous Leaf-nin reached for Sasuke with his chakra-absorbing jutsu ablaze Takara gasped and flinched. When he grabbed Sasuke by the head, making the poor Uchiha yelp, Takara nearly choked trying to restrain herself and recover the scream she repressed.

In the end, though it was only by a bit, Sasuke reigned champion, relieving Takara of her stress. The stress came back when she realized that she, her team mates, and her friends that she cared about would all have to fight, but it was nice while it lasted.

But something came to Taka's attention. "Kaori-sensei, why is Sasuke--" She barely refrained from saying "kun". "-san going with the medics? Is he really hurt that badly?"

Kakashi seemed to hear this, though he was done on the floor below, and gave Kaori a look. Though she gave no acknowledgment of it, Taka could tell she saw and became suspicious.

"It appears so," Kaori said with solemnity that wasn't like her. Taka looked out at Sasuke before he entered the other room and let the moment engrave itself into her memory, because she knew it led to something important.

"Wow, I expected more from the famous Uchiha," an obnoxious voice rang out across the cement auditorium.

Eyes full a fury, not just Takara's, looked to see an admittedly handsome boy with dusty blonde hair and hard black eyes from the Cloud Village.

A fire-haired vixen clad in fish nets smacked his arm with the back of her hand, though it did no damage.

"Shuddup, Tenshou. He was totally hot. Don't talk like you're better than anyone with _his _looks. . ." She set her chin in her palms in sexily simpered at the door Sasuke had just left through.

"Looks aren't gonna get you Chunin, Yuria," a boy with freakily spiked black hair and grey eyes scoffed with the utmost contempt.

"I'll see what I can do, Kaito." The girl crossed her arms, pressing together her c-cups to double the cleavage.

The apparent Tenshou grinned and whistled, outright staring down where it is impolite for gentlemen to stare.

Yuria didn't seem to care and Taka decided she didn't like any of them.

But when the beeping board that randomized the battles stopped its beeping, the latest match was deciphered, that being Aburame Shino, one of her classmates, and Abumi Zaku, a Sound ninja that came across to Takara as mean and even sadistic.

Takara easily decided to root for Shino, because even though he slightly insulted her with his "vow of silence" (as Taka saw it) during their academy years, she was true to her fellow rookies. Plus, Hinata vouched for his trustworthiness.

The battle made Takara realize she was way out of her league here. Zaku, though his arms broken, fought with unbelievable, invisible power. That's what they mean by Sound. It gave Taka a silly thought, that the ninja of the Leaf village should have Leaf-type attacks, but leaves would bend and tear and burn, so that wouldn't work. A silly thought indeed.

But(returning to the main point) Zaku wasn't a match for Shino. Even though his Sound was powerful, Shino had a style of jutsu that perplexed and slightly disgusted Taka.

Bugs? Really, bugs? It was more than strange but still Takara decided that she admired and respected "Shino-san", as she decided to call him.

After the battle that Shino won, the group of Cloud-jerks drew attention to themselves again.

"Eww! Bugs!" Yuria scoffed. "That's so revolting."

Even though Inuzuka Kiba growled when he heard that, Shino didn't react, and though she did think it was a bit strange for him not to defend himself, Taka admired his neutral. He officially had won the title of cool in her book.

"Don't say things like that. Just watch, that's what shinobi are supposed to do," Kaito revolted, his words injected with unneeded poison.

"Wut-evur."

Tenshou threw his head back and laughed outright. When he came back down, he caught Takara glaring at him on the opposite side of the room, gave her a once over, and nodded, pimp-like, in approval. He clucked with his tongue, like a cowhand affirming his presence to a mare, and smirked in a come-hither fashion.

Takara "ugh"ed in digust but Tenshou remained unscathed.

Many other room members, for different reasons, did not. Many of which silently declared war.

"Hey, jerk!" Isao shouted. "You want something!?"

_Sunny days and night that sparkles_

_Love, that glow of beauty bright_

_A room full of silent intentions,_

_Those of wrong and those of right_

**Author's Corner**

**Update here. Review please?**

**Shout Outs**

_Domi-kun: _I'm already plotting their lovers. . . and Kichiro is way smarter. And ooooh! They made a swirl. . . oh my! it's gone!

_Claam-kun: _You're right, Desert.Moon-sama's story rox hard! And I'll try to peg Gaara-kun the best I can, and I know what I'm gonna do. And love the obsession! Strange that we have the same name, though.

_Arch-chan: _Eh, not just Rain boys, all boys, right? And maybe, you never know with Kakashi-kun.

_Punk-chan: _Trendsetter. . . I like the sound of that!! Thank you!! Taka-chan is powerful in her anger, ouch!

_Wateranddarkness666: _Why, thank you! I love my story too. JK!!

_vallin55amaya: _OH MY GOODNESS!! I LOVE the Disney Princesses!! I'll totally read that! And thank you soooooo much for the pic, but it won't work with my computer. Can you tell me where I can find it, or email it to me?

_Hikari-chan: _Well, she's got her angry side and her lovey side. And oh my gosh. . . I knew it from the moment I heard of you! You're special, you know that?! Now, listen good: I've had a lot of OCs in my time, and my most memorable one was named Hikari! She had brown pigtails and wore black with fishnets. She was paired with Shika-kun. . . and yes. I want so bad to pair Taka-chan with Shika, but I'm not sure right now. And no. NEVER. NEVER WITH TEMARI!! DX


	19. Introspective

"What was that?" Tenshou pardoned, half angry, half amused.

"I said, is there something you want?!" Isao balled up and shook his fist. "'Cause I'll give it to ya!!" Kichiro glared harshly, though he wasn't the only one in the room.

"Promise?" He eyed Takara amorously. Taka's eyes immediately went as hubcaps and her mouth firmed to a straight line.

"Hey, how is it that you find her hot?" Yuria fumed jealously. She lifted up her breasts with her hands and held them. "What about me?" she teased with false innocence.

"Yeah, but look at those legs. . ." Tenshou didn't bother to look at Yuria, keeping his lustful, gaping eyes on Taka. He whistled a powerful catcall and slapped his thigh. "Hot, damn!!"

"AUGH!!" Taka's mouth dropped to (seemingly) below her abdomen. Anger filled the consciouses of many people. Kaori felt like skinning the little brat, but refrained from showing it because of her role as a Jonin. She grabbed Isao's scruff to keep him bounding off to kill Tenshou. Kichiro's face contorted into anger, scrunching his nose in intolerance.

Outside of Team Nine, the sensei of and out of the Leaf felt contempt for the uncouth children that dared to call themselves shinobi. Naruto growled and slammed his hand onto the bar. Ino balled up her fist, ready to defend her friend, and Shikamaru, behind her, gave a look that read something only Asuma saw. Asuma decided to keep on eye on Takara. . .

Gaara, on the other hand, just gave a glance in the direction(being right) of the Cloud team. Temari caught sight of this and felt pity on them, but also thought they'd get what they deserved.

Hinata sent the a concerned and timidly angry look, making her fluster.

The angriest person in the room, however, had to be Yuria.

"WHAT?! You're kidding, right?! That troll, that horror, that ogre, that hag, that-- ugly freak!! How can you think SHE'S prettier than ME!!" her arm's flailed and her eyes blazed with anger and jealousy. No, she didn't like Tenshou in any sense, but she could NOT put up with being shown up.

But still, stupid Tenshou paid no heed. "I mean, just look at that--"

Gekko Hayate coughed twice, and pointed up toward the board.

Sabaku No Kankuro versus Tsuruga Misumi, it read.

The boy who mercilessly picked on Konohamaru, also Gaara's brother, went to battle with another Leaf ninja Takara wasn't associated with. Was he even with the Leaf, she wondered. But she dismissed the thought, feeling bad, thinking it was treasonous for her to think that.

The battle was short-lived. At first you would have thought the Leaf won, but Kankuro pulled a trick with his puppet and came out victorious. He redeemed himself with cool points in Takara's eyes.

The next match, however, seemed too coincidental to be accident:

Yamanaka Ino versus Haruno Sakura.

Needless to say Takara was rooting for Ino. But as the battle unfurled itself, Sakura was revealed anew to Taka, and not only her.

She was no longer a friendship-breaking, grade-grubbing, smarmy smart girl who was mean to Ino, but a powerful kunoichi fighting her rival for the sakes of honor and love. Maybe Sakura wasn't so bad but she still wanted Ino to win.

Ino, in the match, cut her hair, saying she didn't need it. This confused Takara, because she had been with Ino the many hours she had combed, brushed, straightened, curled, trimmed, prettied, dressed up, and pampered her hair, but she wasn't going to ask.

Sakura had her hair cut short, and though the rumor that had been spread in their youth was but a rumor(that Sasuke liked girls with long hair), it had carried throughout their academy years and into their genin life. As to why Haruno Sakura, the famed lover of Sasuke, would cut her hair, or do anything to sever herself from him in any matter, perplexed Taka behind recognition.

But she decided to leave it.

And if Sakura could cut her hair, she knew Ino would. Self control in matters of rivalry were impossible for her. Then it dawned upon Takara that she'd have to sit with her friend for hours upon hours of hair care. (And momentarily, some room members found the constantly changing expressions of the Leaf-nin girl to be strange, that she was reacting to her own thoughts, but her teammates found it in the norm.)

In the end of the match, though, it came out as a tie. Was that even allowed?

Both girls dropped to the floor, without any energy left. Takara saw it as sort of fitting, though.

She wondered, then, who _would _get Sasuke, Sakura or Ino?

. . .

For some reason, that question stung.

The next fight Takara assumed would be unimportant to her, with all the thoughts that were already attacking her, but it was quite the opposite.

Sabaku No Temari: She appeared as a laid-back yet powerful kunoichi and sister of Gaara, but never as _this. _

Now, Taka never knew Tenten well, except for that she was the female teammate of Neji, but she didn't deserve to be disrespectfully beaten and to be cruelly mocked.

It mad Takara mad--more than mad!!-- the way that Temari treated Tenten!! She shouldn't do that to any person!!

If she wanted to let out anger, or to even be cruel to someone, she should have done it with her fighting, and at least make it honorable! Such disrespect enraged her.

When Rock Lee stepped in and caught Tenten from falling on an abyss of scattered pointy, lethal things, he told Temari exactly what Takara was thinking. She dismissed him with disdain, as was expected.

Takara noted put Temari into the long, long list of people she disliked. It was a list she often edited, crossing people off and adding them on. It consisted of about 157 people she'd met over the course of her life and they all were written in her list journal. Some entries were more disliked than others and were therefore marked with bitter remarks and angry drawings(normally consisting of the person being drawn with x's for eyes, or little rude faces sticking their tongues out).

Some entries that some very nice, but very bad with judgment readers of some "nameless" story in a place far from this one might identify with some of the entries: like Uzumaki Naruto(with a crude doodle of a spiky-haired boy looking goofy, saying "Ooooh, I like Sakura! She's so pretty! Mah mah mah! I'm no prince, I'd make a better troll! I'll go roll under a bridge!" and a few unctuous remarks of its kind), or Uchiha Sasuke(with a significantly better drawn but still not so exemplary drawing of an x-eyed boy, but it was erased when Taka took his family loss into consideration), or Hyuga Neji(with a googly eyed, and much better drawn figure proclaiming, "I'm mean! I'm not nice to people! I can never have cupcakes again since the octopus witch cast a spell on me for being bad! Oh woe is me. . ."), and as of now, Sabaku no Temari(with a planned, soon to be drawn picture of a the Sand ninja, kunai sticking out of her in all directions and shouting, "Oops, I turned my big head and Tenten shredded me!").

Not far away, but still out of ear shot, Ino punched Shikamaru in the arm harder than she needed to.

"Go on, Shikamaru, give it all you got!!"

"Geez, Ino, could you be any louder?" Shikamaru complained as he grabbed the rail in ready to begin his fight.

Before he could go, Ino pinched him by his collar and pulled him in to whisper.

"My offer still stands about that girlfriend test. You want _her_, you have to prove yourself to _me_. So don't sass me when I'm being nice to you." A smirk graced her thin lips. "And don't embarrass yourself in front of her, either."

Shikamaru didn't respond, and left out into battle.

Ino, a nasty plot on her mind, went towards Team Nine. She reached Takara and leaned against her shoulder, smug as can be.

"Hey Taka-chan, this sure is gonna be some fight."

"Ino-chan. . ." Takara grumbled as worry twisted her features. She knew her friend wouldn't have that sly smile unless she had some plan. And though Ino wasn't the smartest girl, she could manipulate better than any puppet-nin. All alerts were immediately on. . .

"Well, come on, cheer for Shikamaru! He's on my team, and he could really use the encouragement. He's really nervous, though it doesn't look like it."

"What? Is he? Poor thing. . ." All alerts were immediately off. Poor, silly Takara.

A few moves into the fight, Kin and Shikamaru were, but he unnoticeably perked up when he heard a call from the rails.

"Go, Shikamaru! You can do it!" Taka called, fisting the air.

"Yeah, Shikamaru, show that girl what you're made of!!" Ino's support had a twinge of wry humor to it, because only Shikamaru knew what Ino meant.

**No author's corner or anything, I'm too tired. . . . Be glad I updated! Yeah!(Deidara moments!) Okay, I'm done.**


	20. Fighting For Respect

The fight between Tsuchi Kin and Nara Shikamaru was short lived, and the latter inwardly wished he could have done more, but his planned strategy left him without trouble, so he left it at that.

Ino shook her head disapprovingly, that he hadn't pulled some mindboggling trick look she knew he could. Maybe he didn't really like Takara. . .

"Wow, Ino, your teammate is amazing!! I couldn't of thought of that in a million years!!" Takara shook Ino's arm in disbelief but kept fixedly on Shikamaru. On the floor below, a shadow-user smirked in triumph. Ino felt stupid that she didn't realize that Taka is easily amazed by all things smart, as any person with her. . . level of intelligence would be. "Ino-chan, why're you scowling? Shikamaru-kun did so well!!"

"Well--" Ino burned. "--I _thought _he was gonna do something a _little _more _impressive!!_" She shouted, more to Shikamaru than to Takara.

When Shikamaru returned to the rails, Ino made sure to snub him for his laziness, but he didn't care. He knew he'd won.

"Yeah!! How lucky am ?!" Isao congratulated himself that he was paired with Tenshou of the Cloud.

The dusty blonde jumped to the floor before Isao and simpered up at him.

"What are you waiting for? Let's get it going!!" He threw two kunai at the team, narrowly fitting in between Taka and Isao.

"Hey!" Hayate called, then coughed. "I haven't told you to start yet." Isao "humph"ed and claimed a battle ready position.

Isao jumped to the floor and pulled out two kunai. ready to throw.

The man Takara pitied for being sick(and wishing she could send him home to rest) told the fight to begin, and immediately, Isao had to jump back as to not be stabbed with various weapons flung in his direction.

Four more waves of weaponry came at Isao from different angles, but he back peddaled, flipped, and shuffled to avoid them all.

Then, from behind him, a flurry of unexpected senbon skewered Isao in the back, and in his arms and legs.

He fell forward onto his forearms(earning a yelp from Takara) and Tenshou lunged at him, kunai drawn and ready.

With a grunt, Isao thrust his leg backward at the last moment, into Tenshou's chest, sending far back, and making him drop his kunai.

Tenshou struggled to get back up, with what probably was broken ribs, and Isao groaned as he plucked the senbon out of what were thankfully not vital spots.

If this had been any regular battle, like in the many fights in the Forest of Death, Taka would have healed Isao with her medical ninjutsu and that would have been that. But now she was unable to help him, and as the two boys went into close range taijutsu fighting with kicks, punches, and chops, Taka felt hits were on her.

The two jumped at each other, and their hands met, their fingers intertwining, engaging them in a fierce battle of mercy.

"I win. . ." Tenshou slurred, blood streaming down his chin. A clone came up came behind them, a kunai clenched in his fist. And, then, into Isao's stomach.

Takara and Kichiro stopped breathing.

"Nope. . . That's me." The stabbed disappeared in a puff of smoke, and from hiding in the shadows, Isao leaped onto the fight's area and slammed a fist into Tenshou's chin.

"That's for Taka-chan!!" he declared. Tenshou growled and wiped some blood from his chin.

"And this," he added, performing several complicated hand signs. "This is for me."

In Tenshou's eyes, fire blazed the room in the form of wolves.

"Now. . . Sick 'em!"

Tenshou screamed as the wolves jumped on him, burning and shredding him.

In the eyes of Isao, though, the world become frayed and blurred, and white dots of light appeared to be consuming everything he could see.

Just as the genjutsu was wearing off, Tenshou faded from consciousness with trauma plaguing his brain and heart rate drumming at unlivable speeds.

At almost the same time, Isao dropped to his knees, eye lids sinking, and he fell to the ground.

Hayate lifelessly karate chopped the air and decided the fight was a tie.

When the medics came to assist the fallen two, Takara jumped to the floor and began herself applying medical ointment while bandaging the less than little cuts.

"Kid, we'll take care of him--" one of the medics began.

"No, I have to." Takara wasn't particularly fond of someone else taking care of her teammate. It was her job to heal him.

"Kid--"

Isao moaned, but turned a weak smile to his teammate, and Kichiro who came up behind her.

"I'm fine, Taka--"

"No, you're not!" she asserted, near tears.

Tall Kichiro placed his hand on the blonde's shoulder, knowing it his place to cheer her up. For as someone once told him, the elder sibling lives to protect the younger.

"Thanks, Taka-chan." Isao sat up. "I think I'll be fine."

"Good," Takara said, stifling back a sob. In her streak of sisterliness, she tried to pick him up, but needless to say, the little thing couldn't.

Isao and Kichiro chuckled and Taka blushed.

"I'll be okay." He strained to get up, and he limped a bit when he walked, but went well enough. Tenshou, however, blinked up through hazy eyes as he was carried out by medics. He saw a Isao shake a threatening fist at him while Taka had her back turned, and Kichiro gave him a look that read death. He drifted back away from consciousness, vowing that he'd get that girl and show those boys.

"Unbelievable. What a loser, falling for something like a weak Leaf ninja's genjutsu," Yuria complained, with her head in her hand.

"I'm embarrassed to know the idiot. Looks like it's up to us to make a name here for the Cloud."

Hayate coughed twice (and Takara made a mental note to bring him cough syrup and some chicken ramen to help him feel better after the exams were said and done) and motioned toward the board. "Please come onto the floor."

Naruto and Kiba went to battle.

Takara had a hard time choosing who to root for, so she stayed quiet.

Half of her wanted to cheer on Kiba, because he was rumored to be a great guy from Hinata, that would have just killed the other half because his opponent was Naruto.

Naruto proved claimed throughout the battle that he would win and someday become Hokage. Taka never doubted him once, even after their friendship was severed.

That didn't mean she was sweet on him; no, she was still ever so angry with him. But when he won, she wouldn't admit to herself that she was more than glad.

When Naruto came back up, Hinata offered him a healing ointment. Takara found this strange. Maybe she liked Naruto. . . nah, couldn't be. It was just too weird for Taka, and that was saying something.

Takara, though pumped by the battles she had seen, was not ready for what the screen read.

_Raikaze Yuria versus Shizute Takara._

_More than luck,_

_Less than fate._

_Does the Princess have a chance?_

_Or is it too late?_


	21. Jealousy Is A Strong Emotion

"This is gonna be easy, taking out this flat chested loser," Yuria decided to no one in particular. She got into a battle position and waited for the call. _"It's too bad I'm not fighting a boy. Seducing is my speciality, but I can still whip this brat without it. Hot? Her? No way!" _

"Begin," Hayate ordered.

Caught off guard in her thoughts, Taka wasn't prepared for the sadistic bombshell holding a kunai a few feet away from her.

In an attempt to escape stab-dom, Taka formed an X with her fore arms and jumped back. When Yuria came down, her kunai met the cement ground. She showed her teeth and jumped for a second chance.

Ready for it, when Yuria's knife held a few inches from Takara's chest, she spun, like a ballerina, out of the way and behind Yuria.

She kicked Yuria hard in the back, sending her for forward. The fiery-haired Cloud-nin barely caught herself on the ground before her gigantic breasts slammed against it.

She snapped back up, doing a back tuck in the air to prove her grace. She saw then a glass vile with a very purple dust filing it, in Taka's hands. She slid it back into her half-vest's pocket.

"What the heck is that powder? The drug you take to get that ugly?" Yuria barked bitterly.

Takara's smirk didn't waver.

"It's a strength powder." She cracked her knuckles. "Now I'm ready to fight!!"

Yuria lunged with her fist aimed at Taka's face but she caught it.

Though no one saw how she struggled to do it, she flung Yuria's fist(and the rest of her following) over her shoulder.

Yuria fell to the ground, did a somersault, got back to her feet, and immediately roundhouse kicked at Taka's head.

Takara dropped to the ground, avoiding the kick and swept Yuria's feet.

The redhead fell backwards, but in the air, caught onto the ground and did a backhand spring.

Takara, in a squat position, jumped back to her feet just in time to catch Yuria's hard fist with both her hands. That, leaving an opening for Yuria to punch Takara upwardly in the stomach.

Winded, Takara flew back and rolled a bit on the ground, but caught her feet.

This, just in time to see three kunai thrown at her. She jumped to the side, still down, out of the way.

Yuria leapt to Takara's other side and threw two kunai, securing the edges of her clothing to the ground.

"Now, you're mine!!" Blood lust surged through Yuria's system as she ran at Takara. As she approached, though, she slowed with each step.

When she finally reached Takara she had daze-y look an her face, and dropped to the floor, unconscious.

Takara didn't look the least bit confused.

"Not strength powder. Sleeping powder!" Takara jumped to her feet and ran in front of her team, waving and blowing kissing like some superstar while they pretended to be a raging crowd.

The rest of the rookies thought that it was kind of weird, and not just them, but them especially. Not because of the nature of the odd act but because the Isao they knew would have scoffed at the stupidity and went about his business huffily and Kichiro would have furrowed his brow and then shook his head disapprovingly.

But people do change, don't they?

Neji didn't think so. That he made clear in his match against Hinata, which followed.

He mercilessly taunted and criticized her, shaking her down to about nothing.

At one point Takara wanted to shout and tell him to shut up, that it wasn't fair for him to cut her down like that, and that he should prove himself with battle and not just make cruel comments to her. But that was out of line. There was one time where she could tell him something like that, but because it was in her youth, she would have sugar-coated it. But not now. Now he was distant to her and she couldn't tell him what to do or even try. She couldn't even talk to him, though she didn't search for the reason why.

When the fighting did begin, thanks to a push from Naruto, Neji made a close jab to Hinata's hurt, though he missed. Still, it made Takara gasp for her friend's safety.

With his Byakugan, Neji saw that it was Taka who gasped. His grimace hardened and he kicked it into gear.

It maddened, it enraged, it **infuriated **him that she had befriended the Main Branch!!

After all they had done to him-- after all they had done to him with her!!

And the worst thing-- the worst thing is she would never know!! Damn them, damn the Main Branch!

Hinata fell to the ground. The match appeared over, but she rose to her feet again when Naruto called out to her. Takara held her fist hard in anticipation.

She began to rise again, though, inflaming Neji. The Main Branch wouldn't leave him alone!!

This time, with more anger than the first time, he beat Hinata to a pulp, spewing blood everywhere.

The Jonin interrupted before he struck, restraining him from killing her. She dropped to floor, in cardiac arrest, anyway.

After commotion that only troubled Neji further, the annoying blonde-- Uzumaki, was it?-- yes, Uzumaki came and told him off, demanding a reason for his taunting.

Neji responded distantly, because the real reasons were things he wanted no one to know. He didn't even want to know them.

First, obviously he wanted an excuse to tell the Main Branch what he thought. It was demeaning to admit but his unyielding resent for the Main Branch and all those in it made him always want to spout out his feelings of repressed hatred, but he never got the chance until then.

The second reason was buried much deeper in him then the first, being that he knew, he _knew, _that Takara would be in favor of Hinata winning after her abandoned her without explanation. He didn't want to here her rooting for Hinata indefinitely. If Hinata gave up, like he told her to, he wouldn't have to hear Takara encouraging her.

Also, similarly, he knew it would cause Taka to fret over Hinata and he didn't want to be any worse in her eyes.

Of course the latter only made him angrier.

Even though Neji's Byakugan was deactivated, he still saw Takara looking at him in the corner of his eye. He focused his attention to the board that portrayed the matchs' names as to not see her expression.

This, for fear that he would regret his actions. Though he was already beginning to. . .

_Fire melts most,_

_Water drowns much._

_Hate guards the lock_

_Of the caged bird's hutch._


	22. Hidden Power

Gaara of the Sand and Rock Lee fought in the next match.

Takara was surprised. She thought she knew Gaara. He was quiet, and it would be a lie to say he wasn't intimidating, but she never expected such hostility.

Maybe she didn't know him, maybe he was worse then she thought, and maybe he wasn't the person she thought he was.

But she still found herself willing him to win. (And the Beast most have been blood thirsty at times, too, right?)

The battle raged, Lee proving himself more strong than expected, but Taka was more surprised with Gaara's strength. She just expected a simple sweetness to be behind his scary exterior. She knew she was right about him; she just _knew _it, but maybe his true goodness was deeper than she thought.

Gaara, sure of his ability to win, noticed the obvious shock emanating from Takara. He'd shown himself to her, what he was really like.

She was seeing now, he for what he was.

Hatred stained his vision.

Of course, no matter how different this girl seemed, she wasn't part of him. Not part of his world.

Gaara lived in a world apart, he knew. Nothing touched him in his world. It was him alone, that he knew.

That made another world. The one where everyone else lived. They were far, far away from each other.

But this girl-- this one, different girl-- was in neither.

She wasn't on some distant plain in the other world, but she wasn't in his either. She was somewhere in between.

And this, her shock at his power and lust to kill, only pushed her farther away from his world.

He didn't ask himself whether this was good or not, for he feared the answer.

Lee dropped his weights, though, and Gaara had no time for thought.

Rock Lee, or the Leaf Village's "handsome devil", as he referred to himself as, had speed that could only be born of hard, powerful work. It was amazing! But Gaara wasn't easily defeated.

There were many close calls, when it appeared that Lee had won-- no wait, Gaara had won-- no, the fight still raged.

In an astounding show of power, Lee nearly beat Gaara. He fell to the ground in his lack of chakra anguish. But Gaara's consciousness remained dormant, and he sent a wave of sand that grabbed at Lee's limbs-- and crushed them.

Before the finishing, lethal blow was struck, Lee's sensei, Might Gai, as he had identified himself as, interrupted before his pupil left the living.

"Why?. . ." Gaara pardoned, on the ground.

"Because he is my beloved student."

Gaara seemed clueless to this. No doubt his life was without love. Takara became anxious to talk to him after this exam was done.

In Kichiro's mind, scenes played like a black and white movie with faded audio, from the distant past.

_There was a time when Kichiro was happy. So happy that he didn't know what unhappiness was._

_His mother had hair of black but eyes of green; of sparkling emerald green like his own. He loved her so dearly, as a son loves a mother who loves him. His mother was married to his father, a man he cared for but didn't feel such love for. His mother was the one who meant the world to him._

_His blood matched that of the Iga clan, the traveling shinobi group. His father lived as the clan's heir who would take over as soon as his grandfather passed. Though as a traveling clan, Kichiro never made any friends. It didn't matter. He had his mother._

_But vaguely known to him at that time, Kichiro's father loathed his father. He loathed their clan, and he loathed his life._

_One night, one night that would define Kichiro's life forever, his father and his grandfather had a fight._

_It started with smarmy commets and lead into full-throtle battle. They swore, they smacked, and they even stabbed. Kichiro listened, terrified, at the door, hiding from their brawl._

_His mother, though, chose the opposite. She went out to the two with stern swiftness. She was not swift enough, however, to escape being stabbed in the heart by Kichiro's grandfather._

_He said words that Kichiro would never forget._

_"Fight me, will you?! How do you like this?! Do you see this?! Your wife, her blood is everywhere! And all because you couldn't obey me! Don't you understand--" but his grandfather never finished that thought._

_Kichiro's father drove a knife into his throat and that ended it._

_In an attempt to start anew, Kichiro's father took him to live in the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The clan of the Iga dispatched and the rest of the family scattered._

_Kichiro, with his lack of social skills, remained without friends._

_He half cared for his father and half hated him for causing his mother's death. And then, for another reason._

_The two carried with them the traditional Iga clan jutsu._

_At the age of five, each male of the Iga is to sign a pact with Ryuyaiga, the legendary dragon king. _

_It's not something easy. It's painful, and really too much of a burden for a five-year-old to bare, but no one ever intervened in the legendary(yet now nonexistent) ritual._

_As a result, each male member of the family has a tattoo of the golden-green dragon making almost a full circle around his upper chest, that could be fully seen when he raised his arms._

_It untold power, which though gave resolute strength, harmed and exhausted the chakra of its user._

_Kichiro had never used that power before. Though his father trained him in it, he had never used it in battle or in front of anyone but his father. He feared what it could do._

_He could never use it. Especially with them. Never._

Kichiro snapped like a twig out of his trance brought on by Gaara's sand wielding power when Taka concernedly tapped him on the shoulder. She pointed to the board without a word.

Kichiro nodded, still hazy, and jumped onto the floor to fight whoever Ukikato Kaito was.

It came to him that Kaito was one of the Clouds who bothered and insulted the Leaf in many ways, that one he decided he disliked. That made the fight so much easier.

But he didn't know that back in his village, Kaito was referred to as the Human Monsoon.

And not because he was made of clouds.

_Clouds in the sky,_

_Clouds on the ground._

_Thunder booms,_

_But lightning's not just sound._


	23. Dragon VS The Dust Devil

Glaring. Intense, fiery, icy glaring.

It scared Takara right out of her amethyst heart stud earrings.

And then, a break from glaring.

Kaito and Kichiro lunged at each other and their kunai met.

They both flew back and threw their kunai at each other. Both were deflected by the other.

And then there was more glaring.

"Heh. You think you can beat me?"

"I never said that. And I don't think it, I know it." Kichiro's glare hardened.

There was a moment of stone silence.

"We'll see about that!!" Kaito jumped towards Kichiro, making him think he was going to get attacked, but he jumped around to behind him at the last minute, and kicked him in the back.

Kichi was pushed forward but he flipped, using his hands as a base. He flipped over and landed on his feet, then based on one hand as he kicked back at Kaito, trying to hit him in the stomach, but getting caught.

Kichiro's foot in Kaito's hand, he flipped over, sending Kaito flying forward. He caught himself and three shuriken, all of which Kichiro caught. But as he caught the last one, Kaito appeared before and threw a punch at him. Kichiro seized it. Kaito threw more and more offensive blows that were all intercepted.

Kaito threw one hard punch, charged with blue, visible chakra and anger, that Kichiro engaged and clenched hard in his own fist. He held on and pulled Kaito's fist behind his back. With collective chakra, Kichiro duked Kaito in the back, throwing him forward.

"That's it, pretty boy. . ." Kaito got back up, wiping the blood from his chin. "Back home, they call me the Human Monsoon. . ." Up on the floor above, Tenshi and Yuria noticeably stiffened. "I'm going to teach you why!!"

Hand signs followed. Sheep, rat, snake, horse, ox, sheep, tiger. Then, around him, a misty cloud swirled. Still in the tiger seal, screamed:

"**Ninja Art: Eternal Cyclone No Jutsu!**"

Humidity came like water from the ceilings, building in the air around the entire room. Visible winds and mists passed through the people on the hovering floor and a giant cloud seemed to form above the battle ground. All the air currents collected on the field below, around the Cloud and Leaf-nin.

"Now. . . **DIE**!!"

Gale force winds surged Kichiro, covering him with the hurricane on all sides. When it cleared, the recoil threw him back. He was bloody and beaten, and proceeded to cough up what must have been a gallon of water, stirred in with a little blood.

"Oh no, I'm not done with you yet!!" He threw his arms in the air like a sadistic composer guiding symphonies of war, that followed by a rush of wind. He threw his arms towards Kichiro, while he was still down, and the wind followed, blasting the helpless Leaf-nin with chunks of typhoons.

The air and vapor took Kaito's form and beat the bloodied Kichiro, smirking as his actual self.

Kichiro fell back to the ground.

"Are you ready to give up yet, or can I kill you?"

There sat a moment, all silent accept for the flurrying wind.

Just when Hayate took his breath and opened his mouth to announce the winner, Kichiro knelt up.

He wasn't going to lose, dammit, he couldn't! He couldn't dishonor himself, and he certainly couldn't die!

And that meant one thing.

He'd have to use the dragon.

He spit out some blood, and was that a tooth? and proceeded to perform the hand signs horse, ox, boar, dog, tiger, and dragon. He held the dragon seal.

"Ninja Art. . ." He took a long, drawn out breath. "**Beast of the Iga no Jutsu!!**"

Taking no chances, Kaito closed all the winds in the room in on Kichiro, only to have them broken by a gigantic gold and green dragon, extending from Kichiro's mouth. His hands were still in the dragon seal and his were glowing gold. He seemed to be in some sort of a trance.

Collecting the winds that remained after charging Kichiro, Kaito hit the dragon with them every time it came near him, as it tried to get at him.

He noticed, though, how it shrank in size ever so apparently as time passed. He though, _I can just hold him off and take him out once the dragon!_ But he was wrong.

In his thoughts, the dragon, now with the breadth of one of Orochimaru's snakes, lunged for Kaito, coiled his arm and snapping it.

It threw him towards the opposite wall and he hit it hard, indenting the concrete.

After that attack, the dragon sunk back into Kichiro's mouth, but fading out of visibility before it reached it. His eyes returned to normal and he fell to his knees, then to the floor.

Kaito struggled for his feet, and the match was declared over. The Cloud had won.

Medics hurried Kichiro onto a stretcher. Isao and Takara rushed down to him, shock and worry tainting their features.

Bitterness stinging his own expression, Kichiro forced a smile and assured his teammates he was all right. Wanting so badly to follow him, but unallowed to, they returned to their positions as spectators and Kichiro was taken in for medical treatment and chakra rehabilitation.

The next fight was between Dosu and Choji but it was fast and uneventful.

The winners of the fights were called to the floor to receive a briefing on the next match.

To Takara's(and many others) great gratitude, they were being given a month to prepare of the next fight.

They then drew from a box some numbers. Takara got eleven, making her last.

A chart was drawn up, and to her horror, Taka was to fight the Human Monsoon himself, Ukikato Kaito.

_To hide from day_

_Or face the sun?_

_This is for Dragon,_

_Princess can't run._


	24. Second Born Heathen

Takara sighed for the seventh thing in five minutes. She had to take care of her little sister, the ever exuberant Chika, and was therefore forced to remain at home. (Because Chika in public is an ABSOLUTE NO.)

She dropped down on her thick, soft pink quilt on her snow white bed with the heart and tiara moldings and sank into the feather-down blanket. She looked up at her canopy above her and sighed.

She turned to her side and saw a book shelf full of various prettily decorated story books and stuffed animals and sighed. She turned to her other side and saw her movie posters for _Suzumo Daichi and the Temple of Doom _and the various animated princess movies she'd seen and sighed.

She rolled over on her stomach and grabbed a pink Aikuma (**A/N: That's loosely translated "Care Bear"**), Rika, and pouted to her.

"Rika-chan, I'm at a loss. I'm so bored, I wanna go out so badly. . ."

"Taka-nee-chan! Taka-nee-chan!! I'm bored!" the little short haired brunette whined through the locked door. She banged on the white painted wood. "Let's go out!! Please please please!!"

"No!!" Taka yelled, knowing that wasn't the end of it.

"Please! Please! Please! Please! Please! Please! Please! Please!" And it went on.

Taka sighed(once again) and went back to her one-sided conversation.

"That's not all, Rika-chan. I've been training my butt off for fighting that Kaito boy. Kaori-sensei sent me home because I need to regain my chakra--" She rolled her eyes. "And because she's on a date with Kashi-san. I'm glad I don't have to keep doing all that training though." She sighed yet again.

"And Kichi-kun is working me really really hard. I think it's 'cause he doesn't want me to get hurt in my fight. I feel happy that he's concerned about me, but I'm tired, too. . . And the worst thing is. . ."

Guilt welled in Taka's stomach. "I haven't seen Gaara-kun since the Preliminaries. I just. . . don't know what I should say. I'm a bit scared of him, yeah, but most of all, I'm scared he's mad at me. . . I haven't seen him in so long and I think he'll think he's. . ."

She didn't care to finish that because she didn't know what she thought.

"Please! Please! Please! Please! Please please please pleeeeease!!" Chika never stopped her incessant whining.

With anger that didn't befit her gentle pink and white room and eyes that were wider than the furry tummy of her doll she screamed, "FINE!! We'll go the freak out!!"

**Out On The Streets Of The Village**

Takara's guard was down.

This was because she had all of her perceptions on her brown haired, brown-eyed, purple dressed girl gaping and giggling childishly at everyone vendor and civilian. Obviously she didn't get out much.

But Taka couldn't let her out of her sight. Her eyes were transfixed on the vibrant lassie, who looked half way back every few moments to see if she was still being watched.

Taka also kept her ears alert for fear that she'd only be able to hear the faint hissing noise before the fireworks went off in her bra tag. Did you know you can fit explosives in something like that?

She actually went to the point of transfixing her still healing chakra to the surface of her skin to make sure she could feel every inch of her body. Spider eggs in your shoes hatch faster than you'd think, but you don't feel them until it's too late and you have a leg blackened with arachnids.

She kept her nose alert to any and every sensation. Airborne dog feces can be smelt from only five feet above one's head.

Taste was the sense of least use at this point, but one had to be careful when eating things like meat and vegetables because laxative variants can be very cleverly simulated.

"Hinanata-chan!! Nanatahi-chan!! Hihinata-chan!!" Different variations of Hinata's name came exploding like bombs out of boisterous noise mines as Chika jumped and held onto Hinata's torso with her feet off the ground.

"Hinata-chan!!" She sang her finale with love for the girl who had been brought to dinner, sleep overs, and birthday parties and stood shyly by as the more vibrant guests dragged her along in the fun. (Chika took particular joy in being around Hinata, because she was made loud in comparison to her and therefore could be louder than ever!!)

Hinata, still not knowing how to react to this situation after all these times, blushed and awkwardly tried to keep balance. Chika plopped onto the ground and giggled.

"He-he-hello Chika-san. Hello T-Taka-chan. . ." Her less than timid teammates followed up behind her.

""Yo." Kiba raised his hand in acknowledgement. Akamaru barked and Shino nodded.

Hinata informed Takara of her teammates(and vice versa) in one of the few sleep overs they had in the few weeks before the Chunin Exam beginning. (Though they had even fewer slumber parties after they were declared ninja, because every time Hiashi, Hinata's father, heard of such childish acts being committed by the prestigious Hyuga, he pressed guilt further upon her.)

"Hey Hina-chan." Taka focused a scolding look at Chika. "Hey Kiba-san, Shino-san." She giggled and beamed brightly, immediately lightening her mood at the sight of a cute pup. "Hello Akamaru-san."

Kiba simpered that someone addressed his beloved friend. Akamaru merrily barked twice and Taka giggled again.

"How're you feeling, Hina-chan?" Taka set her hand affectionately on her friend's shoulder.

"I-I-I've just been released I'm all right. . ." Hinata slid her pointer finger nail in between rows of teeth and held herself with her other arm. She didn't meet Taka's gaze.

"Hinata, you know you're not okay! You need to rest!" Kiba immediately went protective watch dog. Taka smiled that her friend was so guarded and cared for, even though she didn't notice. Shino quietly agreed but Takara preferred louder expressions of care.

Speaking of caring, why wasn't Chika forcing her reasonless on the people all around her? She hadn't spoken in over thirty seconds.

Takara looked to the place where Chika sat, but she saw nothing. Spastic panic portrayed by waving of arms and ginormous-ing of her eyes played out all over Taka. She looked a bit like a mute, thrashing troll. . .

As soon as her ability to speak returned, and Team Eight could stop her from running up and down the road peeking into every nook and cranny without breathing, she gasped out barely understandable words.

"Where did Ch-Chi-Chika go?!" She shook her friend madly by the shoulders, being ignorant of the fact that she was painfully shy and just recovered from a severe heart condition.

She let go, letting her friend twist and turn dizzily.

"Hey, cool it. What's the big deal?" Kiba was confused by the seemingly crazy girl, who he had once assumed to be a ditzy, stupid popular. (And honestly wasn't changing that opinion anytime soon.) (Really, how was sweet Hinata friends with this girl?)

"You don't understand!! Chika has is my sister, I have to protect her!! Besides, she has no self control!! She can cause more trouble than you can imagine!! If we don't find her, who knows what could happen?!" Taka screamed right into Kiba's face, unmindful of her actions. The boys both thanked their lucky stars that they weren't placed in the same team and her.

In a slow motion, she turned her head dramatically to see a vendor hand a cup of something to Chika.

First Chika fell down on her butt. She sat quietly and the sputtering sister just watched in terror. A low gurgle drawled from the little girl's throat and her face distorted goofily.

Forgetting all manners, Takara grabbed the old salesman by the shoulders and looked him into the eyes.

"What did you give her?! **What did you give her!?**" She screamed and shook, though shaking the skinny old man was harder than it appeared.

"Calm yourself, child." He gripped her wrists and gave her a scolding look. "It's merely a sweet elixir drink I myself prepared. It is safe." He was obviously offended she thought his drink might be poisonous.

"Sweet elixir. . ." Takara released him and let the word register. "Made with what?!" The crazy was back on.

"It is only milk and chocolate. It won't hurt her in any way." He was stern in his voice.

"Oh, that's okay. . . Wait- - -" The girl's slow-to-catch-up mind finally grasped the situation. "MILK AND WHAT?!"

A drunken laugh rolled out of Chika's throat. Taka immediately grabbed her sister's shoulders and shook her hard. Her head flopped back and forth and her expression remained goofy.

"Speak to me, nee-chan, are you all right?! Do you need to go to the hospital?!" Takara screamed on the verge of tears. Passers by rolled their eyes or stopped and took genuine sympathy at whatever tragedy was occurring.

Taka slowed herself down and looked her sister tragically in the eyes. "Are you okay?"

For a tense moment, she was quiet, and everything else seemed to be.

"I'm gonna eat a rat!!" She randomly declared, her face portraying absolute detachment from any and all thought.

". . . What?" Taka pardoned, as thought many of the bystanders, including the Sand Siblings looking over a balcony at the scene.

Chika fell out of her sister's grasp and onto the dirt road. "I'm gonna roll around on the floor for a little bit, 'kay?" And she did so.

Takara's face fell into her hands and she massaged her temples.

"I knew something like this would happen. . ." She grumbled. "THIS IS WHY WE NEVER GO OUT ANYWHERE!! YOU ALWAYS MAKE A SCENE!!" She screamed, making a scene.

Hinata whisper-explained to her teammates in her soft voice, "Chika-chan has a strange metabolism. She becomes v-very energetic. . ." Gaara and his siblings on the roof above could hear Hinata's voice and all their reverence and respect for the Leaf Village(though there was few to begin with) diminished.

"That's it, we're _going home_!!" She threw the debauched child over her shoulder, and she immediately began to buck and bounce.

"I'm dancin' like a monkey!!" Chika's mind was thoroughly gone.

Kiba smirked. "No, Takara, stay. We could use some more ruckus." Taka glared at him, but he had his attention turned over his shoulder. "Speak of the devil."

Naruto came running, jumping the roof tops, and an apparent special Jonin with black glasses like Shino's followed after him.

"Wha-- What it is Naruto-kun doing?" Hinata stuttered, as she always did.

Takara smiled, forgetting that she had a thrashing eight-year-old on her shoulder. She watched Naruto's retreating figure.

When he ran, his arms moved backwards and forwards like cogs in a machine. A machine Taka decided was what he was like. He never stopped and he did what he had to do, whether it was something silly like hanging from the flag pole in front of the ninja academy's dean's office for three hours until he could finally put the baby frogs in it, or when he came and rescued her from the field of back-firing fireworks that they tried to set. Oh, the memories. . .

But she'd seen him running from behind a lot of times before, because she'd never been quite as fast as him, running from the crime scene. Even though he'd grown(but was still shorter than her), he always ran the same way.

Her peaceful reminiscing was interrupted by a loopy eight-year-old's rant.

"Meow. . . ."

"Silly, only cats meow. . ." Takara drawled, still half in her trance. Team Eight(along with Team Sand and the other onlookers) were still in confusion as the blonde genin dismissed herself back to home.

_'Damnit. . .' _Gaara hissed in his mind. _'I'll kill that damn confusing girl. . .'_

_Princess in her palace,_

_Has a troll to haunt her._

_But out in the open,_

_The Sand will taunt her. . ._


	25. Burdens And Bonding

Little Chika never stopped spouting out nonsense all the way home. Takara struggled to carry her all the way there, readjusting her from over her shoulder to on her back, and then just dragging her by her foot. (Though Chika didn't care. She was more preoccupied with the fact that the world seemed to "turn upsy down".)

Takara walked through the front door and involuntarily smiled when she saw her long blonde haired mother, Fumiya, shuffling through some papers on her desk.

"Mom, Mom, Mom!!" She ran up to her, carefully putting the sugar intoxicated child onto the living room sofa. "How long are you staying home?"

"I've got some herbs I need taken to the hospital-- some paper work too-- and then I'm coming back to file medical reports. Why?" Shizute Fumiya sold herbs and medicines to doctors and distributed them to patients for a living, and Takara trained in her mother's footsteps.

"Great, great, great!! I'll take these for you!!" She hurriedly grabbed the paper stacks and boxes of herbs are off table.

"Huh, what? All right, then. But why?" Her daughter wasn't usually so eager to run errands. She was more than skeptical that she had suddenly turned over a new ambitious leaf.

"Oh, I just feel like going out. Ya know, it's kinda cramp at home, and I don't feel like training right now. . ." _'Perfect,' _Taka thought. _'She'll think I'm being lazy from training. . .'_

"You have the Third Exam coming up, you have to train!!" Fumiya scolded.

"I am, I am!! But you have a lot of paper work to do, so I'll just take all this. . ."

"Hold up a minute!!" She knew her daughter never volunteered for work, but Takara pretended not to hear. She walked as fast as she could out the door, paper and herb boxes in her arms.

"Takara, I'm speaking to you!!" The forty-year-old blonde herb specialist felt what was like a three foot tall tree collapse on her leg.

She looked surprised down on her younger daughter, seemingly under the influence of something.

The easily angered woman's face went red.

"You gave her chocolate, **didn't you? . . .**" It was family rule not to give the child any chocolate or chocolate like substance.

She manufactured a smile, waved at the passing neighbors, and hid the child behind her leg. _'She is in SO much trouble. . .'_

**At The Konoha Hospital**

Blank expression and deep in thought of the burdens on her mind, Takara didn't notice the glass doors of the Konoha Hospital and bashed into them.

An anonymous chunin opened the door for her, helped her up, and told her to watch out. Takara nodded and blushed at her own stupidity. The chunin went on his way with all but secure faith in the genin of his village.

Taka went into the lobby. The first sight she came to was like a brick wall of moist green eyes, but she continued walking.

Haruno Sakura, heart heavy with care for her team mate and crush, wasn't expecting to see Shizute Takara's brown, golden flecked eyes. She didn't particularly like the girl and she felt the feeling as mutual.

Takara, wanting to polite no matter the relation(as she learned from her people person mother), gave an obviously forced smile and waved. Sakura just barely nodded, not caring too much. They averted their gazes.

A few moments after they'd passed each other, Taka stopped. She turned to see a pink haired girl exiting through the glass doors.

_'Were those tears?'_

She shook her head and looked down at the ground woefully. _'She's not going through what I am.' _Taka thought bitterly.

She proceeded to the first room with a prescription on the list: room N-12, the intensive care facility, in need of sedative cicely leaves and gingko leaf juice injection, for muscle tissue repair. She absentmindedly read over the name, not caring who it was.

_'But then again,' _ She guiltily reconsidered, _'She might be going through something worse.' _

_'But then. . . what can she be upset about? Whatever it is, Naruto would help her through it, and Sasuke . . .' _

She nearly felt like crying with the mix of jealousy, resentment, empathy, and nostalgia she was feeling. _'I don't know what Sasuke would do to help someone through something, now. I remember when--'_

Takara gave a soft groan and her face twisted mournfully. She had a lot of good friends, and she'd lost them. Then, in her mind, the name on the paper registered. _'Uchiha. How ironic. . .' _She groaned louder.

But she stopped, paled in the face and forgetting all the thoughts swirling inside her, when she felt a cold kunai on the back of her neck.

Quiet and on alert now, she opened her mouth to speak but the kunai was lowered.

"Shizute Takara, right? You should be more cautious." That tired(and kind of sexy) drawl, she immediately recognized. Hatake Kakashi, the only man able to handle Kaori-sensei.

"Hehe, sorry Kakashi-san. I have some medicine here for Sasuke-k--. . . you're guarding him, are you? Is he in some sort of danger?"

"Don't worry about that. But you should be more careful. Don't tune out like that."

"I know, I'm sorry, Kakashi-san." She followed him into the hospital room, to see a sight that shocked and painfully disoriented her.

Uchiha Sasuke, when he cared and when he didn't, was always strong. It disheveled her to see him lying in a white hospital bed, tubes inserted in him everywhere.

Kakashi looked back at the terrified girl. There was a moment of silence, waiting for her to come back to reality.

"Well?"

"Hm? Oh, I'm sorry. I was just. . . thinking." She went to Sasuke's side, gentle care apparent on her face. She opened the top to a machine that kept the air flowing through his lungs and let some of the cicely leaves into the cage.

The fumes from it would keep him in a comatose state so he wouldn't feel the pain of his body healing. Takara had been taught that and many other herbal uses and remedies by her mother.

(Cicely, perilla, and lavender leaves crushed together made the sleeping powder Taka used on Yuria in the Preliminaries.)

Takara then took a vile of teal liquid and let it into a inoculation. She pressed down on the shot a little, as to clear any bubbles. There'd been a time when Taka was too squeamish to take shots, let alone give them, but in the medical training administered by her parents she learned that shots were used to help people.

It was something hard for the naive girl to stomach, and she still shivered whenever she gave them, but like her parents saying that plants had to die to be used for food and to heal people, she had to be strong.

(It had been one occasion when Takara cried her eyes out after getting a booster shot, not because of the pain, but because the medicine had been made with plants that died so she could use them. "It's not fair, Daddy, it's just not fair!! Why do flowers have to die?!")

"Which part of him needs the muscle rebuilding inoculation?"

Kakashi just looked at Taka and she could feel herself being judged, as though he was deciding something. Takara understood and was quiet.

"Here." He pointed to strange black marking on Sasuke's shoulder that Taka didn't notice before. Her eyes widened and she inoculated his collar, forgetting to be jittery.

"What is that?" Takara demanded. She suddenly felt like there was a cult being formed that she wasn't a part of.

Kakashi sighed. She could tell he was contemplating something and that he wouldn't answer her anytime soon.

She turned her gaze to her old friend.

"Sasuke used to be my friend. I don't know why we're not anymore. . ." She gave Kakashi a look of determination. "But I still care for him, very, very much. If it's a battle, I'll fight it for him. If it's a secret, I'll keep it for him. He's my comrade and more. I'll help Sasuke-kun to the best of my abilities."

Kakashi was more than surprised.

"In that case. . ." He pinched his chin in between his fingers and spoke light heartedly. "I'm going to ask you a favor."

She nodded furiously.

"I need some help to take care of Sasuke. He's in no condition to train and needs to heal, and you're right, he's in a sort of danger. So. . ."

She continued to nod.

"If you help to take care of him, I'll be happy to let you."

Takara "sweat dropped", as many call it.

"No wonder you're seeing Kaori-sensei, you're so cheap like her." But Taka bit her tongue when she realized that he might take it back.

"I could get mad, but then, I could tell her. Which would you prefer?" Takara comically stiffened, remembering the only time she saw her sensei mad: when the man at the tea counter gave her lemon basil tea instead of the rosemary tea she ordered. She flipped over the table and screamed words like "inept" and "failure", along with a few words that it is impolite to mention.

"I thought so." He smiled a smile that showed he was at ease, but probably meant someone else was feeling uneasy.

Takara shook to rid it of the unneeded thoughts. "But yes, yes, I'll come to help with Sasuke-kun. But-- why must he be protected? And what's with the mark? Please tell me!!"

"All right."

Then, Kakashi told Taka something she really did not want to hear. He told her about a wicked man trying to capture Sasuke for unknown purposes(though that was a little bit of a lie). Not only that, but he gave Sasuke a curse that would bind him to pain and give him tormenting power. Along with that, Sasuke would have to use sheer will to fight off the evil curse marking him.

Curses? This was all starting to sound like a twisted fairy tale without a princess heroine to Takara.

"But Kakashi-san, why don't you ask Sakura to help you with Sasuke-kun? She likes him very very much and is part of your team."

"Sakura would be a good candidate, but she's not a medical ninja. And-- how do I put this?-- you have blatant chakra exposure. You're distracted so you don't take the time to cover it, so I can read your chakra signature right away. If an enemy tried to impersonate you, I'd feel them covering their chakra and I'd know."

"Is that-- a good thing?"

"In this case it is."

"Hm. . ." Takara looked at Sasuke, then back up at Kakashi. "Thank you, Kakashi-san. I should get going. . ." She felt awkward trying to dismiss herself, but she really had to go deliver the remaining prescriptions.

"Go ahead, but be back here at 5:30 tomorrow."

"Thank you, sir, goodbye! And goodbye, Sasuke-kun!" She waved to the copy-nin and sleeping boy.

**Two Hours Later**

When she'd left Sasuke's hospital room Takara had been floating on Cloud Nine. She still had her head amongst the clouds two hours later, even through the uneventful prescription deliveries.

She was down to her last appointment: room J-07, in the recovering clinic, of healing saw leaf cream and bee balm to steady a bad vertigo, to-- Akimichi?

_'He's on Ino-chan's team!! Maybe she's visiting him! I hope she is, I haven't seen her in a really long time.'_

She went into the room. It was smaller than Sasuke's, as were the rest of the rooms not used for intensive care, but it was nice and almost completely white, with grey floor tiles. The opened window let in a soft wind that blew the white curtain. It matched the walls and the bed sheets.

"Choji-san?" Taka asked, but saw he was sleeping. "Oh, sorry," she pardoned in a hushed tone.

The only other person in the room was a boy with black brownish hair and honey eyes. He was playing solitarily on a board that Takara recognized. "Oh Shikamaru-san, are you playing Shogi?"

"Yeah." He turned back to his game, showing no interest.

"I have to wait until he wakes up to apply the healing cream. Do you mind if I play with you while I wait? I'm not the best, but I like to play that game."

He gestured with his hand that she could go ahead and they each set up the pieces.

"I have a board like this at home, only the pieces are glittery." She giggled a bit. "And have princesses on them." He gave her a look of disbelief, but with good humor. He mumbled something about how things having to be pretty was so woman like.

She giggled again. "What can I say? I'm a woman. And, of course, men don't care for princesses."

"What are you, some kid? You still like princesses?" He said, still in good humor.

"I love princesses! I'm a Ninja Princess, you know." The lethargic boy laughed out loud.

"Are you serious?"

"Why yes, I-- eh?!"

"Checkmate." He moved his piece, and the game was won.

"No way, we just started!!"

"You need to pay more attention."

"Rematch!! I want to win!!"

"Fine, fine."

Throughout the rest of the game, Taka, though trying to pay attention, seemed to be eyeing Shikamaru's face, more specifically, his cheek.

He sighed. "What is it?"

"You have a mark."

"What?"

"Right there. You have a scratch." She pointed to his face. "You must have gotten it in the previous exams. Here, I'm sure Choji-san doesn't need all this cream, he can spare some." She opened the black top and dug two fingers into the peach colored paste. She reached to put it on his face, but he backed away.

"Hey, don't--" She proceeded her fingers onto his cheek, rubbing in the cream. She didn't notice his face redden behind the healing cream.

The two heard chuckling behind them. Choji had awoken just in time to see his friend's embarrassing situation.

"Oh, Choji-san, you're awake. Here, some saw leaf cream; it should help with those wounds." She applied the cream and bandaged the scrapes.

"He's not hurt so badly," Shikamaru reminded her. She was bandaging up even the smallest cut.

"I know, but I don't like seeing people hurt, and I always want to help people as much as I can." Again, she giggled. "As Naruto-san would say, that's my ninja way!" They all understood that.

"Now, here, have this bee balm smelling potpourri. Smell it and it will straighten your head out. That run in with the Sound ninja must have given you wicked vertigo." She leaned in the hand the smellings to him, but she tripped over her foot and clumsily plopped onto the ground.

"Hey, are you okay?" Shikamaru asked, and Choji took a long whiff of the smellings.

"Yeah, I'm all right." Her face completely reddened at her awkwardness. "Choji-san!! Don't eat it, you're supposed to just smell it!!"

He smiled sheepishly. "Sorry."

Taka was going to continue her game of shogi because she was determined to win, but she caught sight of the clock on the wall, and ran out, dismissing herself with a yell of "gotta go" in the hall.

She normally wouldn't have been so rude, but she had a probably infuriated mother, and needed to get home before her being late made things nay worse.

_Sterile white on grey tile stone,_

_Bright florescent light is shone._

_Boy with heart and hand of cold,_

_Girl with tears she tries to hold._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

Like my wonderful senpai, Desert.Moon-sama, I've finally reached chapter 25!! Hopefully I'll make it to one hundred-- NOT!! I'll probably move to a sequel by then.

Were the descriptions to anime for ya, CherryBlossom? She knows what I mean. ;)


	26. The Day That Sucked

The people who saw her on the street thought she was less than sane, the strange girl contorting her face as though she were suffering pain, following behind a seemingly happy woman. The truth was, Takara was recalling the fight she had with her mother to be allowed to come watch Sasuke after giving Chika chocolate and dumping her on her.

When arguing with her mother, Taka made sure not to make her too mad and be kind in making her point. Being a secretly flammable woman, Fumiya wasn't the kind, mild mannered woman the other villagers thought she was, at home. Takara could recall more than a few smackings(that in retrospect, she deserved) and having to stand for hours in a corner with her hands behind her head.

But arguing over the right to see Sasuke was different. She was more passionate, because in her imaginative fairy tale mind, she saw him waking up and smiling at her, and her smiling back, and then-- she didn't know what. But she just figured she'd decided it when she got there.

The argument went something along the lines of this (In the house with the drapes closed, mind you, because it was absolutely unacceptable for Fumiya to let her or family's reputation to be tarnished. **UNACCEPTABLE**.) :

"Mom, you don't understand." Takara put her hands in front of her, trying to form a wall in between herself and the fuming woman.

"I don't, huh? Then why don't you explain as to why you directly disobeyed me!!"

"Mom, it wasn't me who gave Chika the chocolate!! She snuck away from me and drank some from a vendor! You know how she is."

"That is _not _what I asked! I asked you why you _disobeyed _me!!"

Disobedience: The thing that earned many of the well-deserved smacks.

"Well-- Mom. . ." Takara knew pushing it would only make the situation worse(and that she was probably wrong).

"Well?" Fumiya put her hands on her hips and waited.

_'This is bad, bad, bad!!' _Takara thought to herself. _'I must withdraw, withdraw and she'll let me go-- no, that won't work! I should surrender, just give up and hope she'll show mercy! Oh, who am I kidding! She would never let me off the hook! Crap, this just isn't going to work. But I have to go see Sasuke-kun some how! So-- I know, I'll--'_

"Answer me, don't ignore me!!" Her rage was boiling and it showed.

"Mom-- I just-- I'm sorry. I made promise to Kakashi-san that I'd take care of Sasuke-kun in the hospital." Takara thought that receding would be the best course of action because fighting it was absolutely going to get her nowhere.

Fumiya was surprised and showed it. _'Sasuke, Uchiha Sasuke? That boy from the-- and what of her with Taka? I haven't heard of them with each other since-- how many years has it been?'_

"Please, Mom?" Takara attacked her mother while she was off guard. Maybe she'd take pity because of the friends' reunion.

"Well then, we'll have to ask Kakashi." Maybe not.

"Whatty what?!"

"You heard me." She grabbed her daughter's arm and pulled her to the house door, but let go once out in the open. It couldn't be known that there was something behind that brick wall of willingness to please people.

Takara wanted badly to run away in any direction as fast as she could but she valued her life too much to do that. But maybe-- no, it wasn't a good idea.

They set out on an embarrassing search, containing Fumiya walking around demanding the whereabouts of a specific masked ninja. All the while, Taka followed behind her, flustered. They went into the hospital, and on their way in, Takara saw Sakura. This time, they didn't meet gazes. Sakura was looking woefully at the ground. Taka saw her on the way, and knew she was watching her from behind as her mother dragged her hand toward the center of the lobby.

Takara was most embarrassed by that.

They found that damn Kakashi. He was wandering around the hospital hallways in the intensive care area and reading that book of his.

(Takara presumed it to be-- dare she think it-- porn!! That thought made it very hard to talk to Kakashi comfortably of respect him very much(though she did anyway), because, her being the classic prude, she could barely say "sex" without flustering and whispering it.)

"Is there something I can help you with?" Kakashi put his thumb in between the pages in his probably pervy book so he could keep his place after his conversation.

"Yes, in fact, there is. Takara-chan-" Fumiya pinched her daughter's ear and pulled her in closer. "has told me that she's promised to take care of Uchiha Sasuke-san? Why would he need to be taken care of?" She put her other hand on her hip.

"Oh, yeah. I asked Takara if she would take care of Sasuke while he was healing. Is that all right with you?" His tone was so relaxed that it made Taka want to strangle him, but somehow, she knew her mother was about to. Verbally, at least.

"Oh, is that right? Then if you've made a promise you'll have to see it through. See you when you come home, honey, we'll talk later! Goodbye, Kakashi-san." Fumiya screened a deadly smile that made Taka shutter. She was rarely wrong and when she was, _everyone_ suffered.

Kakashi gave Takara a pitying smile. She let out a huge sigh and duly acknowledged him with a raised hand. She was far too exhausted from being embarrassed all day to care about being rude to an elder. Luckily, she knew he wouldn't really care. He was too busy with porn.

Takara pulled a wooden chair up to the side of Sasuke's bed. She immediately took a glass vile of sandy purple powder out of her faux-leather messenger bag.

A tender mixture of lavender, catnip, chervil, peppermint, bouquet garni, yarrow, thyme rosemary, strawberry seeds, and lavender made a concoction that was linked into Taka's chakra, as she had established.

Long before she had become a ninja, before the ninja academy, and before she could even talk, Takara had memories of smells. These smells plagued her.

As she grew, her mother taught her all herbs anyone could know. They each had their own smells, each had their own textures, and each had their own colors. But to Taka, they were all associated with something, because that was the only way she could remember them all.

Rosemary reminded her of ashy fireplaces unlit in the summer, bringing back memories of winter when fire was needed for warmth, but left dusty when the cold fades. Shiso reminded her of the lonely feeling one has when out on the town with the girls, messing with waiter boys and checking out boutiques, and being not quite into it, feeling left behind the others somehow. Mint reminded her of sitting on red brick steps holding a baby blue clad porcelain doll. Costmary reminded her of underwear shopping.

All of her associations had to do with the times she remembered smelling those herbs. Her mother made a career of selling herbs(Thus explaining her people pleasing. Rudeness does not a saleswoman make), therefore she was always around some essence of medicine.

She often came to know herself as the Princess, her Majesty of Medicine. (That made her mother the queen, her father the king, and her sister the fool.)

She actually spent one summer making a perfume(like she takes pride in making her other cosmetics) out of herbs that seemed to match for each princess: Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and every other. Twenty-seven she made, using all the unimportant princesses from fairy tales, even the ones without names).

Herbs, herbs, herbs. Takara was always surrounded with herbs. And when growing up, she found her talent in medicines. So that's what she based her nin-techniques around.

The spice previously mentioned, called barrier spice, is used by herb using shinobi, that they create to be specific for them, and then place around them so they know their proximity.

Using a specific chakra signature specifically matched with the powder, they can keep track of anyone about the barrier spice, like a Byakugan with sense because of the powder. It normally took years to master it, but Taka had absolute talent. In this, at least. Though she didn't have it perfectly, she was far beyond that of other herb-nin of her age.

She scattered the powder around the room, especially along the windowsill and door. She formed a rabbit seal with her hands and the chakra in the powder surged. She knew he would be safe.

It was a mystery for exactly how long Takara spent just staring at Sasuke, letting her mind wander to all the fun they had had together. She thought about the man who placed that curse on him.

She'd thought of what it looked like: a man with a long brown beard and crooked nose spouting black magic words, and then Sasuke falling to his knees in pain, the curse mark fresh upon him.

She longed to have been there, to know what happened for herself, and to be able to help him. But then, she knew she couldn't handle that thought. She stopped it before she burst into tears.

Still, her princess train of thought made her believe a little bit that if she were to eliminate the twenty inches or so between her lips and his that he'd wake up, and poof, happily ever after. But her cynical teenager train of thought and general common sense knew that would be a stupid decision. Anyway, she'd never kissed a boy before, besides her dad, cousin, grandpa, and uncles, and she didn't want her first kiss to be with an unconscious, hospitalized boy who would never know about it.

Of course, it's not that she didn't want her first kiss to be with Sasuke. Of course she did, but-- wait, that's not right. She wouldn't mind really, but-- no! She didn't want to kiss him. She couldn't! They could never-- but wait! No-- But-- she sighed out all the strange thoughts and weird feelings.

Three hours passed and Kakashi returned. When he came in, he found Takara just staring at Sasuke, with this terrified and hurt expression on her face. Then she smiled sourly, then she looked like she wanted to cry, then she smiled painfully. He, as gently as he could, told her she could leave. She just nodded and left.

Takara went to train with Kichiro. He noticed that she was being extremely quiet, which was unlike her, so he let up on the severe training a bit. They practiced hitting targets with kunai and shuriken. He taught her how to release her chakra into the weapon so it packed more punch, but it was harder for him to teach her because she had a water chakra type, in contrast to his lightning chakra type.

The spared with hand to hand combat in taijutsu. Though Takara always hated getting sweaty, she knew it was necessary to improve. Besides, she wasn't in the mood to let little things get her down. There were far too many big things getting her down.

They silently waved goodbye, Taka's heart still heavy. Just when he shouldn't have come in, Isao came running out of the woods.

"Hey, sorry I'm late! I got caught up with my dad, he got mad for me not doing my chores-- annoying old man-- oh, you're leaving already? Don't you think you could train some more? You have the Third Exam coming up, you'll be fighting that Kaito, and Hyuga Neji, and Sabaku No Gaara, and Uchiha Sasuke. They're all damn strong, you know." The mention of the last two names, that Takara wasn't sure how to deal Gaara and that she was worried about Sasuke, felt like two punches in the stomach.

"I know, don't you think I'd remember that?! If you were here on time, you'd know that I've been training. How is it that you're three hours late?!" Taka's rage was squeezing out like a someone pinching the opening of a balloon that was blown up so big it was about to explode.

"Hey, what's with you? Why are you having such a crappy attitude? I'm not trying to fight, but you should train." Isao narrowed his eyes. He'd always been a snappy boy and he was ready to fight it out. Kichiro watched wide eyed and helpless.

"I'll train when I want to! I've been working all day and I'm going home, okay?! Geez!!"

"What's wrong with you?! Chill out!"

"I will not chill out! Don't yell at me!!"

"You're the one yelling!!"

"Why don't you just shut up!! Leave me alone!!"

"Shut up?! You--"

"Cut it out, you two!!" Kaori-sensei jumped down from the trees around the training field. They yelled at each other all the time, but there was never anything behind it until now.

"Isao, if ya wanna train, come on time. And Takara." She turned on the girl. "Don't lose your temper. Control yourself, and don't talk to your teammates like that."

By now, the tears that had been banging on the backs of her eyes all day were pouring down. Messily down her face they went, her eyes turning red, she didn't speak because she was afraid she'd sob and further increase her embarrassment.

She choked out, "I'm sorry. . ." and ran away as fast as she could. When she was sure she was out of earshot of her shocked comrades, she let the real cries out. Low, pitiful sobs that had been dying to come out were pouring out so badly she could only breath with tight, drawn breaths.

Takara could barely see through the mess of salty water slinking out of her eyes like evacuees out of a burning building, so she stumbled on a tree branch and fell to the ground. Of course it hurt her hip where she landed and would surely bruise later, but she just let herself slide into a tree and wept.

Three hundred yards away, Byakugan eyes watched in shock.

"Neji-kun, what is it?" Neji had abruptly turned his attention from training to something out in the forest, which really surprised Tenten.

"Nothing. Just continue," he said and turned back into a fighting position. It wasn't his business; he didn't know her anymore. He hadn't known her for a long time.

It was late afternoon when Takara landed there, and the sun was setting when she got up to leave. The pain of the many incidents had long since subsided, but she enjoyed letting the stress out. Still balling into her hands, she got up to go home. She stopped in an open field upon a hill with a gorgeous view of the sunset. She hiccuped once and stared up at the sky. It was a gorgeous sight, and without a sob, she let a pair of tears fall. A sad smile graced her and for a moment there was peace.

"You okay?" Shikamaru was sprawled lazily on the hill but his eyes were widened in concern.

Taka "gaahh!"ed because she failed to notice him and was now reddening in embarrassment, though she was red enough, especially around her eyes, from so much weeping.

She turned to run away but tripped over her own ankle and fell onto the ground.

The blonde pouted back at dark haired boy. This wasn't her day at all.

"Why are you crying like that?" Takara curled up in a cross legged position and hugged her knees.

"It's a long story." Taka focused on the green of the grass, but she sat as though she wanted to tell it.

He sighed and breathed out a "fine".

Wide-eyed and vulnerable, she opened up and let verbal vomit pour out, from the way her mother embarrassed her to the hours she spent crying. She was careful to avoid any names, and she did mention the meetings with Gaara-- but again, avoided using his name and the real reason for staying away from him.

"I'm just-- stressed," she finished.

"I know what you mean. I have mom who nags me all the time, too. And Asuma is driving me crazy about training. But who were those guys, anyway?"

"No-- Nobody, really! It's-- no one you really know, I don't think-- eh--" Taka was never all that good at lying.

Shikamaru raised his eyebrows on his apathetic face. Takara giggled sheepishly. The boy sighed and dropped his head back down to the ground, staring up. Taka found a place next to him and stared upwards, as well.

"Are you watching the clouds again?"

"Again?"

"Remember-- no, you probably don't remember. Just-- when we went to lunch before meeting our jonin sensei for the first time, you said you were watching clouds. It's stupid of me to remember, but--"

"No," he interrupted her apologizing for recalling such events. "I just didn't think you would."

"Oh-- okay. Oh my goodness, look. It's gorgeous. . ." Takara pointed up at the sky.

"Huh."

The two watched the purple, pink, orange, silver, blue, and yellow clouds while the sun faded over the brim of the horizon.

Takara was always mesmerized by colors. She could stare at them for hours at a time and still not understand them. They weren't like music she could listen to, where she could hear and understand. They were something apart, something spectacular.

And here with this once in a lifetime sunset, being with Nara Shikamaru, Ino's presumably lazy teammate, she found she enjoyed herself.

Though on the scale of princes and frogs he was still, by far, a frog because charming he absolutely wasn't, but he was someone she decided to add to her list of loved ones.

The terrible day faded into a wonderful night.

_Black, blue, purple, grey_

_Dull and dismal tones of day_

_But clouds of orange, pink, and white_

_Mean a splendid, dazzling night_


	27. Princess of Nightingales

Takara woke up in a princess-tastic mood. Her hair magically didn't get as messy over night as it usually did, and retained the strawberry smell of her shampoo.

For breakfast, by some miracle, her mother decided to cook a big feast with all the works: tamagoyaki(a rolled omelet), natto(fermented soy beans), miso soup(made with tofu, green onion, and seaweed), and nori(dried seaweed with a roll of rice).

Shizute Fumiya never cooked. She was far too self dependent to be confused at all the with general house mother stereotype. She cooked only on rare occasions, and it was seen by the family as an ominous omen.

The reason behind her cooking was because she was in a good mood, for had made a pact with Hyuga clan to let her supply their medicines, and she would be paid handsomely. It was a fantastic, almost a binding families.

Luckily, Taka got out of the house before she could be force fed the burnt, poorly prepared cuisine. On the way to Sasuke in the hospital she stopped by a restaurant she hadn't been to since she was a child: Ichiraku Ramen.

She lifted the cloth hanging to look inside. She seated herself, glad that no one but the owners were there, Ayame and her grandfather. They were people she hadn't seen in years and they both stared at her when she walked in, in awe.

"Is this a good time, or should I come back later?" Takara smiled shyly.

"It's fine," Ayame finally answered.

"Okay then. May I please have one chicken ramen?" Takara was always careful of her words around elders, especially ones she didn't know very well.

She remembered, though, back in the day, she'd always order chicken ramen and Naruto would always order miso. Look where that got them: Takara was tall, at least six inches above any other girl her age, and had broad features and thick muscles. All that meat paid off. While Naruto remained not particularly muscular and shorter than other boys his age.

Taka chuckled to herself because at heart, he was much broader and braver than her.

"So, you were Naruto-kun's friend, weren't you? You used to come here all the time." Ayame's grandfather set down a steaming bowl noodles and broth. He didn't realize he touched on a subject that Takara didn't want to talk about, but he found out when it showed on her expression. She just popped egg of the ramen in her mouth

"Oiji-san! Don't pry!!" Ayame(and most other people) only use the formal honorifics when they're in formal situations or they're fighting.

"It's okay, Ayame-san." Takara cheerfully stirred her ramen. She was hungry and wanted badly to eat, but one of her greatest fears was eating in front of other people, and Taka would wait until the two had their attention elsewhere.

Ramen she was especially embarrassed to eat, because even though she had so much practice in her friendship with Naruto, she never quite mastered eating it without the soup trickling down her chin and revolting slurping noises coming from her mouth. But still, her gracelessness in eating it didn't keep her from doing so, back when she had been close to Naruto.

She wondered where he was, and what he was doing. He must have been training. . . yeah, training hard! He was the type to work through the night and up to morning, hard!! He would--

Taka heard a sneeze. "Oi, hey old man!! Miso ramen, please!!" An obnoxious voice clamored. It was a voice Takara would recognize anywhere.

A visible, almost electric shiver went from her toes to the top of her head.

She went incognito, untying her ponytail so her dark golden hair fell over her face, and she took off her vest and dropped it quietly on the other side of her, so she appeared in different ware.

She didn't feel like the awkward conversation or worse, awkward silence, because her mood still radiated with some princess-tastic-ness.

Naruto sat himself and immediately dove into a story about how he was training with an apparent "pervy sage" and how he made a summoning contract with the toads.

He looked at the girl on the other end of the ramen bar, but didn't give her much regards. He greeted her cheerfully, and she waved out from the wave of hair, but said nothing. He asked if he knew her, but she shook her head no.

The ramen shop workers were confused by this, but also said nothing.

Takara enjoyed so much hearing Naruto's incessant ramble like she used to. It was like a teacher seeing student as an adult long after graduation, or a lover seeing her inamorato years after their separation.

When Taka finished she laid the money down. She waved and grunted a goodbye before continuing to see Sasuke. Even with the time she burnt she was still early. She ponytailed her hair back up, put back on the half-vest, and cheerfully progressed toward the hospital.

Naruto was a little suspicious of the girl at the other end of the table. He knew he had heard those sounds of slurping before. He searched every crevice of his mind. Where had he seen her before. . .

Then it smacked him. Smacked him hard.

"Takara-chan!!" he called out to her. She didn't even look behind at him, just ran, and didn't look back until she reached the hospital doors, breathless.

Naruto chased her half the way there and was surprised that she ran away. She'd confused him: first she ditched him as a child, but he assumed her to just be like everyone else who ignored him back then, though that really hurt because he thought he had made a friend.

But now, her behavior was just perplexing. Why would she run from him? he didn't do anything. Oh well, he'd see her later. Naruto went to find Jiraiya to train, while Taka caught her breath at the hospital doors.

Still early, Takara went into the lobby and towards the stairs. Before she made her ascent, though, she noticed a pink flash in the corner of her eyes. She turned around slightly and saw Haruno Sakura, who'd been there yesterday and the day before, as well.

Sakura looked the nurse at the counter directly in the eyes and said something Taka couldn't hear. Sheepishly, the girl responded and Sakura sadly nodded.

She turned to walk away but Takara was struck by inspiration: Taka's religion said, and she always made it in her principles, that she should make people happy when she could.

"Sakura-san!" Taka said, but she was too far away to hear.

She ran up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder. Sakura turned, surprised, but then Taka was at a loss for what to say.

"H-Hi, Sakura-san. Long time no see."

"Hm? I saw you here yesterday." Sakura normally would have snapped at the girl, her being a friend of Ino, but she wasn't in the mood.

"Oh yeah-- that was embarrassing. But-- what's-- the matter?"

Sakura was caught off guard. "N-- Nothing."

"Oh. I see. Well, if you do feel upset, you can talk to me about it, okay?" It was beyond awkward to try and talk nicely to her supposed enemy, but she wanted to share her fabulicious mood with the world.

"Oh-- kay." Sakura turned to walk away, but Taka wasn't finished.

"Wait!-- Uh, wait were you asking? Did you want to see someone?"

"Yeah-- I wanted to see Sasuke-kun. But for some reason we're not allowed to see him."

Taka stiffened. What?

"Oh. Okay. Well, if you're feeling okay, that's good. Just-- bye." Takara wasn't the smartest of people, but she knew well enough that sharing her agreement to visit Sasuke with Ino would get her killed, and the same for Sakura.

_'But wait, Sakura-san is on the same team as Sasuke-kun. And Kakashi-san knows that she likes him. So why did he choose me to take care of him?' _ Takara wondered while Sakura said her equally mild goodbye and left the building. _'Oh well, I'll ask him when I see him. And anyway I'm glad he chose me. I get to see Sasuke-kun now, and I have something planned.'_

Taka made her way up to Sasuke's room. Just as she had done the day before she sprinkled the barrier powder around the room and surged her chakra into it.

Instead of letting herself dwell in sorrow like she had the other day, she took a golden book with red laces and put her plan into action.

Operation-Make-Sasuke-Heal-Faster: read to him the most fantastic article of literature since ever, that being a book simply titled Fairy Tales, listing all the princess-esque stories ever written.

It was two dictionaries thick and filled with happy, childish pictures, but Taka always read it before she went to sleep every night.

She hoped it would cheer Sasuke subconscious up. She knew he couldn't actually hear the stories she was going to read to him, and really she didn't want him to, but she thought it was the best thing to heal anyone in any situation.

It always helped her, anyway.

Immediately, Takara turned to the story she had been reading most lately. Then, to the other one she had read most in recent time. They were Beauty And The Beast and Cinderella.

"Sasuke-kun, I'm gonna read you story so you heal faster and feel better, okay? But we have to choose: do you wanna hear Beauty And The Beast, or Cinderella? Hm?"

There was silence for a moment while Takara smiled warmly over the comatose boy.

"Cinderella it is. Once upon a time. . ."

Taka dove into the tale of the Princess of shoes. She dramatically portrayed every character and situation, reacting emotionally to every of the story's occurrences.

She deepened her voice grandly for the King, copied the sexiness of Kakashi's drawl for the Prince, fluttered sweetly for the Princess, and squeaked for the mice and birds. She even flapped her elbows like wings for the latter.

Not only that, but she inserted the songs in where they belonged. She had them memorized word for word, by heart.

Now, Shizute Takara was one of the luckier people: she hit quite the gene jackpot.

Her father had great common sense and was talented in medical arts(but was awkward in social situations) and her mother was beautiful and had singing talent(but had a fiery temper).

Sadly, Takara inherited only a few of those traits: She was book smart, yes, but lacked common sense and the ability to figure things out. But still, she got the medical talents. From her mother, gained the beauty and the singing talent, though her mother had more of an opera voice, and Taka had more of a Christina Aguilera voice. (And just as sadly, she gained both their faults.)

So, as genes allow, Takara actually had a surprisingly pleasant singing voice, though you wouldn't expect it. She never really thought about it, she just enjoyed the feeling of singing.

Meanwhile, Sasuke's conscious, far from him, heard a sound ever so familiar. But because he wasn't in his usual train of thought, he couldn't search for the meaning of it nor decipher where it was coming from.

The still pulsing mark on his neck sent black poison to his heart and mind, and all he could think of or remember were the torturous memories of the Uchiha clan massacre.

But then, when he heard that ever familiar sound, he recalled something entirely different:

_Seven and a half year old_ _Sasuke threw a shuriken at his target and narrowly missed it._

_"Augh!! That was so close!!" He'd been practicing for hours and it showed._

_Then, like she always did when he was trying to train, Takara ran up to him. She was so annoying that way! Didn't she understand that he had to train?_

_"Hi, Sasu-kun. I brought you a bento box lunch, just in case you were hungry." She blushed and held it out, as if she were insisting something alien. But she did it every day, and they both knew the nature of the situation. _

_Taka saw Sasuke as a prince and Sasuke saw Taka as an annoyance, but they both knew that they were best friends._

_"Thanks, Taka-chan." He smiled and she smiled back at him. They opened their bentos, but Taka didn't take a bite until he did._

_After that first bite, Sasuke held it quiet in his mouth for a while. His face went a little bit green so he swallowed it down._

_"How is it?" Takara was always excited about it, trying new recipes and such to make him._

_"You made it, didn't you?" She nodded the answer. "Um-- yeah, it's great." He gave a sheepish grin._

_"Oh, thank you, Sasu-kun!! I knew you'd like this one!!" Takara herself took a bite, and after it, she smiled with just as uncomfortably. "On second thought, I'm not hungry right now."_

_"Me neither."_

_"Well-- that's a good aim you have, Sasu-kun. You've been practicing haven't you?" He blushed and nodded. "Well, there was something I wanted to show you. . ."_

_"What is it?"_

_"Now that I'm here, I can't remember. . . let's see, it started with R. . . no, N. . . yeah, N. Hm, I know it was something to do with animals. Animals, animals with N. . . Nurse shark? Norwal? Natterjack? Nits? Night owl? Night monkey? Night lizard? Nighthawks?"_

_"Nightingale?" He guessed._

_"Yeah, that's it!! Now I remember!!" Takara busted out her fairy tale book that she insisted on reading to him all the time. Sticking out of a page towards the beginning of the book, though, was a brown grayish feather._

_"Lookit lookit look, Sasu-kun!! I found a nightingale feather!!"_

_"Where'd you find it? The nightingale don't come around this time of year."_

_"Magic, Sasu-kun, it's magic!! It's a nightingale feather like the song from Cinderella!!" She put her fist in her other hand and held it at her heart, promptly sticking her elbows out. She began to sing._

_"Sing sweet nightingale, sing sweet nightingale, high-igh-igh-igh-igh above me. . ."_

_Her voice then was small and sweet, like that of a little girl. But then, it collided with another voice._

"Sing sweet nightingale, sing sweet nightingale. . ." This voice was louder, more three dimensional, and more mature. Still, it retained that sweet tone.

Sasuke could hear, but he couldn't think. He was still too out of it, but towards his subconscious came flooding memories of his childhood, and not the depressing ones either.

His awareness eventually come to him, and it came softly. He peeled open his eyes just a bit to see white light through the glass of the oxygen mask he was wearing.

Now soft, his onyx marbles turned slowly to the only other person in the room.

He knew this person, he knew her. It was Takara,

"The day right after Princess Ella and the Prince became one in a wedding so grand and white with flowers so many that people came from all around to see. And afterwards, they all lived happily ever after."

She spent a few moments cherishing the ending before closing the book and hugging it tight, that familiar bright beam on her face.

He knew her. He saw her and he remembered: of everything that had been taken from him, of everything that left him behind or he had to leave behind, she was there. She was the same.

Sasuke involuntarily turned the edges of his mouth weakly into a smile.

He shut his eyes again and fell back into sleep.

Takara slipped the nightingale feather back in between the pages as her book mark as Kakashi came to relieve her from duty.

_You can run but you can't hide_

_You can't get on your enemies' side._

_It's your choice of whether you'll fail:_

_Do you believe in the nightingale?_

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

Sorry for not updating for so long again, but I'm going on vacation! We're visiting D.C. and Williamsburg and all those boring educational places. :P

But I got to ride on a train, over night! We got the biggest cabin! Hey, Taka's mom isn't the only one who can get things done.

What's the moral of this story? Simple: review! Makes me happy and you get a cookie.

But you get no cookie.:P All for me.


	28. My Most Favorite Thing Ever

"A dream is a wish your heart makes. . ." Shikamaru heard singing from over the hill where he was peacefully relaxing. His first instinct was to think it was Ino, but Ino couldn't sing.

"When you're fast asleep!" A familiar ditzy blonde came up over the horizon of the hill.

Shikamaru was propped up on his elbows and he turned to who the disturbance was. When Takara saw him looking at her she waved her arm frantically over her head and went running towards him.

Two hundred reasons for her coming to him came to mind but none of them seemed quite right.

What did she want, Ino's whereabouts? No, she wouldn't come all the way out in the forest for that.

Did she need money and think that because they bonded yesterday that he'd just give it to her? No, she wasn't a mooch.

But then, maybe she just wanted to be around him? No, he quickly dismissed that thought. It must have been about Ino.

"Hey Shikamaru-kun. I have something to show you today." She said "today" like she'd be coming every day. He innerly groaned.

Then he had a thought, that he wouldn't have to suck up to Ino about "proving himself", but he dismissed that thought as well. He was going to give up on the troublesome girl.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Were you sleeping? I didn't mean to wake you."

"What makes you think I was sleeping?"

"Well, you look really sleepy. And Ino-chan says you're lazy." Taka smiled as though it were funny.

"Of course," he mumbled and sighed.

"Well, Shika-kun--"

"Shika-kun?" No one had called him _that_ before. Not even his mother gave him pet names.

"Yeah, it's your name now, okay?" She beamed at the look of anguish on his face.

"Fine." Shikamaru gave up and smiled, but only a bit.

"Well, look here! I brought my favorite book ever to show you. It's a book of fairy tales. What do you think of fairy tales?"

"Fairy tales? What about them?"

"Like, do you like them, or which one is your favorite?"

"I don't know. I don't read them. I'm not a kid."

Needless to say, Takara was offended. She propped her wrists on her hips and dropped her jaw.

"They're not childish! They're romantic and sweet and all wonderful classics. Here, I'll show you. Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess. . ."

"Oh man. . ." Shikamaru muttered, not expecting nor wanting to hear a princess story.

But against his will, Takara proceeded through the Frog Prince story. Like she did for Sasuke, she put her heart into telling said story.

She told of the princess dropping her golden ball into the well, and of the Frog fetching it in exchange for her hand in marriage. But the Princess, not wanting to wed a Frog, ran back to the castle and left him.

The Princess was later having dinner with her father, the King, when the Frog came into the dining hall and asked to be seated with them for the meal.

Of course the Princess said no, but when the King heard of their verbal pact, he agreed to enforce it.

The Frog sat on the table near the Princess and asked for her to feed him. The Princess became fed up and went to her bedroom to escape the Frog.

Once there, though, she set her hand under her comforter to lift it up to find the Frog.

She became angry and was scared enough so she took the Frog and flung him at the wall.

The Princess, not meaning to really hurt him, picked him up to find he was severely injured. She apologized a million times and cried for him but his life was fading.

Then, out of impulse, she laid a single kiss on his lips. Magically, he began to transform.

The little Frog changed into a handsome Prince!

He told of the evil witch who cast this spell upon him for being shallow and how the kiss of a loving princess could save him. The Princess and Prince married the next day and lived, together, happily ever after.

By the end of the story, Takara's eyes were glittering and sparkling. She seemed on Cloud Nine by the "happily ever after".

"Fantastic, right!?"

"How cheesy. . ."

Takara's heart dropped into her stomach, which proceeded to drop into her colon. Then her colon imploded.

"How can you say that?!. . . ."

"How can a kiss from a woman make you less shallow?"

"It implies love!!"

"How can you fall in love with a frog?"

Takara poked Shikamaru's nose, pushing it back like that of a pig.

"_You're _more of a frog than a prince, you know!!"

"I know what I am, and I know what I'm not. And I'm no prince."

"Well fine then! Whatever! I d-don't care. . ." But, instead of storming off angrily as Ino would have done, Shikamaru was surprised when she plopped down next to him.

"Why are you still here?"

"Am I not welcome? I'm sorry I called you a frog." She smiled sheepishly.

"No, I thought you'd run off. Get mad a run away like a woman."

"Well first of all, I'm not just any woman. I'm a princess!" She pumped her fist in the air, earning a raise of eyebrows. "And I had a nice time watching the sunset with you yesterday, so I wanted to do it again today. Is that all right with you?"

"Sure, go ahead."

"You know what? I think you'd like the fairy tale more if they had songs with them. You wanna hear a song?!"

"Uh--"

Taka giggled dove into another story, one of her other favorites, Mulan. Technically, she wasn't a princess, but she was put in great honor like a princess at the very end, so Takara counted her.

Her favorite thing about that story, by far, was the song, Reflection. She enjoyed singing it and felt it described her, sort of. So, she put her whole heart and soul into singing.

Shikamaru was dumbfounded by her singing voice. It was like being in a theater play only in reality, or some surreal dimension, or-- some fairy tale story.

She didn't break in her notes, and though he wasn't talented in music, he thought she could go into the business.

Even more so, the way the dwindling light shone from the sky, orange upon her, and the way the clouds painted the background purple, pink, yellow, silver, and orange again, it appeared so unreal, so-- beautiful.

When she finished(though he wished she hadn't) she advanced through the rest of the tale.

After the story telling, the sun was nearly set.

One glance at the stupefied expression on Shikamaru's face, though, and Takara was set into hysterical laughter. His jaw ajar and his eyes wide that way looked too cute!

Her laughter confused the boy even more. What could possibly have been so laugh-worthy?

"What are you laughing about?" He was almost insulted.

Taka didn't stop laughing to answer. She loved these few precious times when something very funny or very engaging was taking place, so she could just let herself laugh.

Laughing had a special refreshing feeling that tantalized her senses. She loved to just let it go, even long after the said funny thing had lost it's funniness.

"Hey, what's the big deal?!"

"You-- You-- You--" Takara could barely manage laughing and breathing at the same time, let alone talking as well.

"What's so funny about me?" Shikamaru was now thoroughly insulted. _'Figures,' _he thought.

"Your face, it looked so goofy and adorable!" Her laughter was subsiding. She pinched his cheek and pulled in a little bit like a touchy visiting aunt. "So cute!!"

His face lit up red for reasons he didn't care to think about. Takara just kept giggling and pinching. She took herself it upon herself to poke and pinch at his face making him make silly expressions.

It couldn't have been any funnier to her, but to him, it was anything but funny. It was humiliating and embarrassing.

He tried to fight her off, but every time he pushed her off, she'd come back on him, pushing him over and poking at him. He couldn't even use his real strength on her because she, as is obvious, was a girl!

He backed up yet again to avoid being picked and pinched in the face and she plopped herself down at his feet instead of advancing.

"Sorry, Shika-kun. That was kind of stupid of me, but you looked so silly I couldn't help myself!!"

Still red in the face, he gave her a nasty look, but he couldn't help but to smile. "Ch, troublesome woman. . ." was all he could manage.

"Shika-kun, don't bind yourself by those woman-man things. When comes down to it, it's whoever it's smarter, really, and that can be a man or a woman." To add to her point, she poked him in the stomach.

A gasp escaped from his mouth and he snapped up into a sitting position, grasping his wound.

"What is it, Shika-kun?"

"Nothing, and quit calling me that." Shikamaru was beginning to grow annoyed.

"Okay, Shishi-kun." A groan and a giggle, and you can guess which each came from.

Then a malicious idea hit Taka. She dove her fingers into Shikamaru's side. With a yelp he grabbed her wrist and glared hard.

"Cut it out." Great, he could feel his face turning red again.

Prideful Takara wouldn't give up just like that, though.

"You just wait, Shika-kun, 'cause when you least expect it, I'm gonna get cha."

"You better not."

"Okay, okay. . ." But her expression told a different story, something along the lines of her having something different planned.

"Shika-kun, tommorrow you have to bring your favorite thing ever, okay? 'Cause I showed you mine."

"What? Listen--"

"Please, Shika-kun? It's not fair that I show you mine and you don't show me yours. Please? I'll be good." She puffed out her lip and did an outrageous puppy dog pout.

He sighed again. "Fine."

"Awesome, thank you!!" Takara hugged him tight around the shoulders, again changing the color of his face to red.

"Buh-bye, Shika-kun!! Gotta go!!" She waved behind her head and raced off giddily, trying to make it home before she broke curfew.

When Shikamaru caught up with himself and cleared his throat of the frog in it, he shouted to her retreating figure. "Don't call me 'Shika-kun'!!"

He thought he heard her laugh, but maybe he was just imagining it.

_Chuckles, laughs, and giggles,_

_However they are said,_

_They have so many meanings:_

_They are how love is bred._


	29. Sasuke Meets Cinderella

Jolly as could be, Takara swung her bag beside her as she made her way to the hospital. In an even better mood than yesterday, she couldn't wait to go see "Sasu-kun".

As she entered the glass doors of the Konoha Hospital, Haruno Sakura exited them.

In her happy torrent, she waved to the pink-haired kunoichi.

"Hi, Sakura-san. Your hair looks silkier today. Have you done something special with it?"

Cracked from her woeful state, Sakura at first looked stunned. Then she twirled the end of her rosy locks.

"Yeah, I tried the new Herbal Essences rose and lily release." Sakura still didn't meet Taka's eyes. Instead she examined Takara's face for any and all signs of contempt or sarcasm. Takara was obviously plotting something.

"Oh my gosh! I heard about that! You know that Chikafusa Agasa advertises for it? She is so cool, especially in that movie she did with that hottie, Denjiro Eiichi! I hear there's gonna be a whole cosmetics line for it, too. I can't wait to get the lip gloss!!" It took a few moments of excited blabbing for Taka to realize she was ranting. She blushed and apologized for it.

Sakura narrowed her eyes suspiciously and put her hands on her hips.

"Why are you talking so nice to me? You aren't my friend, you're Ino's friend. You don't like me. What are you pulling?"

"Nothing, and you don't know that. You just looked upset so I thought I'd say something. And it's true your hair looks glossier." She smiled. "Ino and you are rivals but that doesn't make us enemies, does it?"

Sakura stood dumbfounded.

"So, how about it? Let's meet up tomorrow at 1:30 and we'll go shopping! It'll be fun, we can hit up that new boutique."

"O-- kay." Sakura didn't look too sure, but Takara beamed.

"Awesome! See you tomorrow, then."

Sakura stood stunned at what she had been sucked into and she pondered what could have been the real nature of the situation, because it was awfully strange for a supposed enemy to suddenly make peace. But could she really be concerned? No, it couldn't have been so.

Taka proceeded to the room she had visited the past few days where her Sasuke waited.

"Hello, Sasu-kun!" She spoke to him as though he were awake. "I have a story special for you today. How about I tell you the Swan Princess? That's always a good one."

Not expecting an answer, she went straight into the story, demonstrating every one of the moves with her own body. She jabbed her arms as though sword fighting and shook her hips and waddled as though a she was a prissy heiress on parade.

"And they all lived happily ever after!" Takara finished grandly. The Swan Princess was one of the shorter stories.

The previously comatose boy smirked and flickered his eyes under his oxygen mask.

"Wha?!-- Sasu-kun!! You're awake!!" She jumped to grab him in a hug but recoiled when she realized that they weren't the happy-go-lucky friends they once were. He just smiled peacefully.

"Never changes. . ." he reminisced.

"I'm so happy, Sasu-kun!" Taka clapped her hands together. "Sasu-kun! Sasu-kun!" she sang, glad that for once in a very long time that she could say his name again.

He made a move to take off his oxygen mask but was failing due to the harness it had on his head.

"Here, let me help you, Sasu-kun!" She sang his faithful nickname and took off his mask. "Oh, you're probably hungry. I'll go get you some good food!"

She mentioned playfully on her way out of the door, "Don't worry, I won't be the one cooking it."

Sasuke, now sitting up in his bed, let his mind wonder on the situation. He had just woken up and wasn't fully conscious yet, but he could only feel happy seeing Takara the way he always used to.

But realization dawned on him hard.

One: He had the Third Exam to train for, especially because he had to fight the Sand boy who beat Lee.

Two: He had already wasted time he could have been training with.

Three: He might still have been unable to use his Sharingan.

Four: He still had that damned curse seal, whatever it was.

And Five: He couldn't be around Takara. What if he became her best friend again? Whoever his best friend could be would be hard beyond hard for him to kill, but to kill Takara? He could barely breath at the thought.

Sasuke often imagined what it would have been like, to have to kill her. . . she was leagues weaker than he, so it could be done easily.

But Sasuke had nightmares occasionally, and even recently, where he was walking to the bed side of the one he had to kill to obtain his Mangekyo Sharingan, with a knife in hand. He flung open the blanket to see Takara, as she was as the child he knew, peacefully sleeping.

And against Sasuke's own will, he dove down his dagger. And the rest was too scarring for him to ever recall in his consciousness.

These nightmares, and many like them, didn't occur often, but when they did, he would push them to back of his brain. He couldn't think about them without tearing further into his heart and soul, breaking apart his solidarity and the very base of his being.

Of course Takara wasn't the only one he had these nightmares about for his mother and father plus Kakashi, Sakura, and Naruto often stood in place of the victim. But it was all the same. He repressed them and told himself that it was absolutely necessary for him to commit to the act of killing his best friend.

And recently, just after the Forest of Death experience, Sasuke was feeling more eager and ready to be the ninja he could be, and complete the Mangakyo process, as well.

He wondered why that was?

Takara came back into the room with a tray of steaming hot entrees: beef ramen, domburi, pot stickers, egg rolls, and Sasuke's favorite, tomato onigiri.

"I brought your favorite!" Taka pointed out, but Sasuke had already noticed. He thought she wouldn't remember such a thing, though.

"How are you feeling, Sasu-kun? Even though you're awake I think you should relax some more. Rest up, you know?" Takara lifted chopsticks swirled ramen up to his mouth as though she was going to feed him. She held it in front of him for a moment, waiting for him to open his mouth,

"Come on, Sasu-kun. You've got to be hungry. You've been out for a long while and those injected nutrients can't have been enough."

Sasuke looked up at her, angry at all that burdened him, and flared his Sharingan. He slapped away the chopsticks in front of him.

"What do you think, I'm some IDIOT?! I--" He hunched over in pain, clutching his red curse mark and crying out in pain.

Taken back, Takara reached out for him and sat out of her chair, knocking the tray and all of its food and china to the ground. The glass broke and the tea spilled, but neither cared.

"Sa--Sasuke!" Taka reached over him and looked for what it was that was hurting him. To her utter shock and dismay, she found that it was his curse mark.

Taka put her hand to his shoulder and tried to contain it with her medical ninjutsu, but it didn't help.

Sasuke sat for a moment in utter agony until his deactivated his Sharingan. On the back of his neck, though, he felt dots of wet warmth.

He looked up in curiosity to see Taka above him with tears pouring from her eyes.

"Sasuke. . ." she choked out. "Please be okay. . ."

Takara held him tightly, hugging him against her. Sasuke was surprised but allowed it.

He pushed her away gently with his hands on her shoulders.

"I'm sorry I'm such a--" She hiccuped a stifled sob. "Crybaby."

He only averted her gaze.

The mess of glass and food on the ground was shortly picked up by Takara, while she was trying not to cry.

"I'll go--" She hiccuped again. "Get some more food."

Sasuke remained in an awake, yet comatose state, until Taka returned with a new tray of food.

As he ate in silence, she watched him intently with a forlorn expression on her face that tortured him every time he dared to look at her.

He had had enough after a few quiet minutes and dropped his chopsticks hard on the plate.

They shared another moment of noiselessness.

"Please-- Sasuke." He gave to her his attention. Whenever she didn't use an honorific or nickname it meant serious business. "Don't scare me like that again."

Another moment of silence.

"Kakashi-san told me about how that man--" She hiccuped yet again. "Gave you a curse. I'll pray for you, Sasuke-kun. I just want you to be safe and be okay. All--" For a final time, she hiccuped. "Right?"

Takara smothered her tears into her face a final time. Still, he refused to meet her reddened eyes.

"Why are you here?" He finally managed. It would have been so easy for him to look at her after everything he had gone though now, because he wanted so badly to be a carefree child with an equally carefree friend again, but he couldn't. So he didn't look at her.

"Because Kakashi-san asked me to take care of you."

"I don't need you to. Leave me alone." He injected all the poison he could into those words, knowing that weak hearted Takara would be hurt and leave.

"N-no. I ha-have to take ka-care of you." Taka was stumbling over her words to keep together when she felt attacked. I p-promised Ka-a--shi--ka-shi-- hey, wait! That would make a good nickname!!"

_'Typical Takara. So easily distracted. What kind of ninja does she make?' _Sasuke reminisced again, feeling sorry for her teammates, but secretly enjoying getting to witness as classic Taka moment.

"I'll call him Kashi-kun now," she decided. "And Sasu-kun is getting kinda old."

Sasuke gave her a perplexed look for he was honestly confused.

"I'll call you Suke-kun!!"

Against all wills of his own, Sasuke let out a laugh that he failed to repress.

"Suke-kun! Suke-kun!" Taka sang out the nickname a few times and giddily clapped her hands together.

"Here, Suke-kun, now that you're awake, I can read to you while you're up and you can hear!! We'll read-- Beauty And The Beast!!"

So consumed by surging happiness, Taka jumped to get the fairy tale stories book out of her bag but she tripped over her ankle and fell to the ground.

That time Sasuke didn't suppress his laugh.

Two hours of blithe laughter later Kakashi came on the two.

He was surprised to see his stoic pupil so carefree in comparison to how he behaved all the rest of the time.

As soon as Sasuke saw his sensei enter the room he ceased all expressions of happiness and went blank faced.

"Hey, Kashi-kun?"

Kakashi humored her. "'Kashi-kun'?"

"Yeah, Suke-kun helped me come up with a new nickname for you!!" The "Suke-kun" blushed in absolute embarrassment. Kakashi's eyes crinkled in absolute amusement.

Then Taka caught sight of the clock and narrowly gasped.

"Oh, it's good you're here, Kashi-kun. I need to go and meet Sakura-san. We're going shopping!" Taka scooped up her belongings except for her Fairy Tales book which she, for some strange reason, held up grandly in front of Sasuke.

"Sasuke-kun," she addressed with all the serious she could muster, though neither male in the room took it seriously. "Because you're in need of healing and cheering up, I'm going to let you borrow my precious book. You know how much I love this book so please take good care of it!"

Taka stumbled over a few more words, nodded, and left the two alone.

It wasn't until late that night, when Sasuke was scanning through the book with nothing better to do, did he find a core shaking nightingale feather tucked in between two pages.

_Cheers and jeers_

_Smiles and frowns_

_Our stoic boy_

_In memories drowns_

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

**Problems with this chapter: Taka being Mary Sue-ish, Sasuke being out of character, and it being very late. Among other things. cries and goes emo**

**Ah, oh well.**


	30. A Takara Story: Inhibition

Takara was struggled to fall into slumber, somehow empty of things to fall asleep to that night.

There were no noises that kept her up. There were no lights that were turned on that shouldn't have been. There were no uncomfortable fabrics in his pajamas and the room temperature was just right.

So what was wrong? She knew.

It was the thing that she feared the most.

Tears squeezed out of her eyes as she tried to shake it away, but to no avail.

It had her isolated.

_Don't leave me alone with myself,_

_Or _**I'll**_ come and get me._

_When no one else is around,_

_I lurk around me,_

_And wait to strike._

_When it is dark and the lights are off,_

_I come and find me._

_I fear myself, for what I might do to me._

_No, I'm no murderer, and I'm no sadist._

_But I am a heckler, a self doubter, _

_And that is why I fear myself._

_Bitter am I, stung by jealousy._

_I am poisoned and unstable._

_I am unsafe to others._

_I am one who judges, and,_

_I too often dream of my own bounty._

_I am selfish and vain._

_And I am my target._

_No one is safe,_

_As long as there are people like me._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

**Let me explain: this is a poem I wrote a while back, and I realized that this pertained to what Taka-chan was going through.**

**So here it is, to help the next few chapters make sense.**

**Poor Taka-chan, insecurity is something you wouldn't have expected. . . or is it? You tell me.**


	31. Pretty Little Ugly Girls

When Takara invited Sakura to go shopping that morning she was in a fantastic mood. Now knocked off of her high horse, she regretted her decision.

They met in the Tea District and greeted each other politely though the silence that followed was awkward. Taka found herself in a difficult position trying to befriend a supposed enemy.

Wandering around, they found nothing but vendors trying to sell overripe fruits and the same old restaurants. There was silence, ever so tense.

"Hey-- how ab-b--" Something bad was happening and Takara knew it. Something that came and attacked her when she was the weakest: her inhibitions. And she had so many of them.

They passed a woman flapping around a pink stylish looking magazine by a rack of many more.

"Nagahashi Kyoko on the cover of Glitters! Special Interview, and chance to meet her and record a commercial! Going for 90 yen!"

All those girls on the covers of those magazines: Taka wondered what it was like to be them.

It's not that she thought she was ugly, not really. Not really. It's just that rarely felt pretty. No-- she never did. And it was hard.

Taka never liked to look in mirrors. Also she didn't like to talk to people who weren't her friends, or who she felt little in the presence of. And that was what she felt around Sakura. Pretty, pretty Sakura.

"How about here?" Sakura nonchalantly pointed to the new boutique that had opened just a few days before, called Narcissa Black. With equal nonchalance Takara nodded.

Inside it had dramatic set up of modernly lit make up stands with teenage girls fawning over their contents. There were manikins dressed in the most stylish of cute yet sexy clothing. There was so much pink, too!

There were racks of glittery satins and fish nets as far as the eye could see. And oh, there were so many pretty girls!

Takara's confidence fell in like it so often did. It wasn't something uncommon. Actually, she felt that way most of the time. Darnit, why did she have to ask Sakura to go shopping, anyway?!

She pinched the edges of her try-to-be cute ninja wear.

"Really cute, isn't it all?" Taka tried. Sakura nodded but was totally consumed in awe of the girly glory.

They immediately went to work, though Takara only did so half heartedly and the awkward silence was still there.

Just as feminine as can be, they shuffled through many glittery, ruffly, soft, rhine stone-y, expensive, and very adorable outfits. It had a sort of princess-loli shota-little girl-exotic dancer-gothic lolita style of attire and every girl in Konoha seemed to be fond of it.

Stacks of clothing piled in their arms, Sakura and Takara went into the changing rooms, planning to take turns trying on ruffly orange shirts with short plaid shorts and pink maid uniforms with fish nets and stiletto pumps.

The attendees, women with short side ponytails in black and pink scout outfits, went around like buzzing drone bees tightening the ties and adjusting the straps of everyone trying anything on.

As they were taught to, though, they paid no heed to any of the customers' occurrences and only spoke when spoken to.

It took a lot of unanswered convincing, but Sakura and Takara finally got an isolated section of the dressing area with mirrors surrounding the entire room. They plopped their clothes down and started changing from behind dividers that kept their bodies from being shown.

First Sakura went in a tried on a beautiful Grecian goddess style dress that was beyond lavender at the top and faded into deep violet at the bottom.

"What do you think?" Sakura asked out of obligation. She didn't seem to happy to be out and about either. "I think it sags too much on the stomach. . ." she muttered to herself and tugged and turned in her dress.

"Totally cute. . ." The first thing Taka noticed about the dress was the way it showed just how skinny Sakura was. She was so petite, so effeminate-- just like a princess. Taka felt like crying out in jealousy.

Of all the girls on magazine covers, of all the movie stars, of all the upper class girls, of all the girls prettier and happier then Takara, Sakura was the one who made her feel to weakest.

Sakura who Naruto liked. Sakura who got paired with Naruto _and _Sasuke. Sakura who got to see those two every day. Sakura who had the luscious pink hair. Sakura who had the skinny little figure. Sakura who had the best grades in the academy class. Sakura who had _everything_. She made Takara feel like nothing.

Taka wasn't sure why she even invited her to go shopping. Maybe seeing her down made her seem more human and approachable. Maybe. But whatever it was, Taka regretted it.

She knew not speaking anymore of it and not assisting in the finding of matching shoes was rude and totally unfriendly but she just couldn't bring herself to.

Next Takara struggled to fit on a tight pink belly shirt with poof-y sleeves. She wiggled her size 7 self into what she thought was a size 7 jean mini skirt, though it was tighter than it shoulder have been.

Could she have been sizing up? Oh no. No. That was it: diet!

Her parents and friends always told her that her weight and sizes were in accordance with her 5'2 height but she bought.

And now she positively felt gargantuan in comparison to the girls her age, specifically Sakura, who still fit into children's sizes and not junior's.

Suffocated by the tiny outfit, Taka waddled out from behind the divider. Sakura just stared at her, motionless with the frilly light blue dress in her arms.

Takara blushed and looked away. "Don't laugh."

"I wasn't gonna laugh." Sakura went and loosened the ties but it didn't help. She sighed. "I really don't feel like shopping today."

"Neither do I," Taka confessed, easing out of her pink velvet entrapment. "Maybe we could go shopping some other day. Just not today. We could bring a bunch of our friends and take pictures of ourselves with the clothes on like models. . ." She might have been up to doing that that day, but she was far too low on confidence and happiness.

"I guess. . ."

There was a moment of silence, but it wasn't awkward. It was more a mix of sadness and concern.

"Sakura-san, please tell me what's wrong. That's why I wanted to go shopping with you. I'm worried."

Sakura looked upon Takara in surprise and thought it through. But it was still silent.

"If you don't wanna tell me, that's okay, too. Just know that I want to help you."

There was yet another moment of silence.

_'Well. . . maybe I'll tell her about what I'm going through. . . Then she might feel better. Schadenfreude, right?' _she thought.

"You know right now I'm hurting, too. I have a friend who I'm afraid to talk to," she referred to Gaara, "and I haven't seen in so long. I miss him but I'm afraid." Sakura looked again at Taka in shock, but this time it wasn't the the-news-was-just-broken-wow kind of shock, but more like that can-you-believe-that-we're-actually-connecting kind of shock.

"And I have another friend who I keeps worrying me. He's very sick, and all I can do is pray he'll get better in time."

"In time?" The pink-haired kunoichi blinked at the suspicious likeness in their situations. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well-- you know, in time to not miss much."

"Then why were you coming to the hospital these past few days?" Her tone was accusatory.

"To run errands for my mom. She sells herbs, you know."

They shared another moment of silence, this time with eye-locked staring.

"Oh--kay." She buried her chin in her knees and her feelings in woe as the two were rested and slumped their backs on the mirror behind them, sitting on the ground.

"Are you having trouble with someone like I am?"

After another little moment, Sakura nodded softly without sharing the gaze.

"Well then-- Sakura-san, if you ever feel upset, you can tell me. Okay? Trust me. We're not enemies."

"What does that make us?"

". . . Friends?"

". . . Okay."

They smiled at each other and shook hands.

"I don't know about you, but I wasn't having very much fun shopping. How about we go to--"

"The library?" Sakura recommended.

"Yeah! We can get clothes some other time. But today they're getting the book I've been waiting for-- a pop up Cinderella book!!"

"Pop up Cinderella? That's so childish," the lover of Sasuke giggled.

"Oh, but I love princess stories! I know where all the good ones are, too. Say, what are your thoughts on the Frog Prince?"

_Whether ugly or pretty,_

_Whether sweet and tart._

_Friendships can connect and touch_

_Everyone's heart._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

**HOLY CRAP DID YOU GUYS NOTICE THAT THE BOUTIQUE NAME WAS A BAD GUY FROM HARRY POTTER?! I PROMISE I HAD NO IDEA. THAT IS THE CREEPIEST THING. . . EVER. THERE'S JUST A BOUTIQUE WHERE I COME FROM CALLED NARCISSUS AND NARCISSA SOUNDED MORE GIRLY AND BLACK(OR PINK) WOULD MAKE IT SOUND COOLER. BUT . . . WEIRD.**

**Hershey, Pennsylvania was really cool. But there could have been more chocolate. I'm on my way home on a train right now, and be glad(or sad) that there's nothing to do because that's why I wrote this. :P**

**Review because I will reply. And it makes me update faster. And it makes me happy. :**

**And Domi-kun? I'll include the description you asked for in the next chapter throughout. Because I don't feel like junking it together in a PM. **

**And L Kunoichi-chan? Update your Frosty Neji story! Grrrr. . . . 3**


	32. Tickle Fights

Sakura and Takara found at the library that they shared the loves of adventure and romance stories, along with the works of Akako Akio, Shunsuke Taro, and Zenshiro Aira.

After a cheerful goodbye to her new friend Taka went to go do what she was looking most forward to: seeing "Shika-kun", as she had so dubbed him.

When she walked out over the sloping hill with the new library books in tow she saw a relaxed, dark haired boy looking up at the sky and leaning on his elbows.

Taka's slow stride turned to a sprint.

"Shika-kun!! Shika-kun!!" Shikamaru turned and looked at her with a smirk of confident anticipation, as though he had something good planned.

"I've been waiting here for a while. I thought you weren't going to come and I was about to leave. Where've you been?"

"Sorry, sorry. I had another commitment and got caught up. So did you bring your favorite thing with you like I said?"

"Commitment? Like some special date?"

"No, not any date. Just today."

Takara was on a completely different plain.

"Anyway, where is it? I wanna see." The reason Taka loved so much to be around Shikamaru was because he wasn't the type to get caught up on the little things that she did, like looks and other peoples' opinions. He was calm and that calmed her.

Not to mention that he was fun to mess around with. It was so fun to dishevel him! Whenever she left him, she couldn't wait to see him again. Everything about him was just so perplexing.

"Here." Lazily, Shikamaru gestured to the wooden box beside him, that Takara, for some reason, didn't even notice.

"What is it? Are there crabs in there?"

"No, it's-- what? Crabs? Why would there be crabs?"

"I dunno, I just thought maybe you'd be a crab person, and have pet crabs in your box." She imagined a chibi-Shika wearing a crustacean costume and snapping his claws.

"What?" He shook his head to rid himself of the randomness. "No. It's a shogi board."

"Shogi? But that's what smart people play."

He perked up an eyebrow. "What're you saying? I'm stupid?"

"No, it's just that everyone I know who plays that game is all genius-y."

"Maybe just in comparison to you. 'Genius-y'?"

"No! I know how to play, and I'm not too bad. Why don't we play?"

They did play, and the game was not far in when Taka thought that she had the advantage. One move of Shikamaru's piece proved her wrong and won him the game.

"What? You can't move that there."

"Yes, I can."

"No you can't, you have to put that one on the other side of the atari piece first." Shikamaru pointed to exact place where it needed to be.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Rematch!"

He sighed in loss of the argument he didn't even fight. "Fine."

The next game Shikamaru dragged out even further. This was because he wanted to see the expressions of utter tensity on Takara's face, the way she widened her eyes and pursed her lips as though they were fighting a real battle. And he couldn't help but chuckle.

"Laughing at your defeat?" She smirked, moving a piece.

"No, yours." He moved his and the game was won.

"How did you do that?!"

"Forethought and scrutiny."

The blank look on the dumb blonde's face demonstrated that she had no idea what those words meant.

Shikamaru sighed, but he was amused. Today he was the one winning the situation.

"Can you teach me?"

"What?"

"I wanna learn. I wanna be a genius like you."

"Beating you doesn't exactly take genius work." Shika smirked and Taka scrunched her nose angrily and crossed her arms. They both knew it was true.

"Yeah, but I wanna be able to beat you."

"Why should I teach you, woman?" The smirk was still ever so teasing.

"Teach me or else." Takara leaned over the board to get her face closer to his. She never liked losing and was pridefully threatening him, though she had no idea what she would really do.

"No way, I don't--"

Like a puma killing for the sake of killing as they so often do, Taka lunged over the board and onto the unsuspecting Shikamaru.

Shikamaru looked up in utter surprise at her. His genius mind could come up with about 80 results from this and 15 things to do to counter each of them. Before he could initiate any of them, she started to tickle his sides.

Before any other reactions could be decided on, he burst out laughing. He struggled with her wrists, trying to keep them away from him, and succeeded.

Using all the restrained strength he could utter, he used Takara's hands to push her over but he turned with her. Hovering above her with his knees on either side of her, the teasing smirk returned.

Two fingers he dug into her side forced a loud laugh out. He smirked more wickedly and continued tickling her like she had him.

Because he was so much stronger then her, he could hold her down, no matter how wildly she struggled. And how she did.

Caught up and not his regular self, Shikamaru didn't bother to think about the idiocy of the situation.

In a desperate attempt to escape Shikamaru's tingly grasp, Takara jerked to the side and out from under him, facing the other way and laying on her side, but he reached and pinched her side, making her giggle again.

Wanting to get payback, Taka lunged at him, like a crab(as she previously imagined), squeezing his sides. He jumped a bit, but saw the opening and went for the underneath of her arms, which were unguarded.

She burst out laughing again, now feeling totally dominated. And Taka didn't like to lose.

Shikamaru just noticed how cute her laugh was, forgetting how stupid he would feel later.

Takara's arms were clamped down to suppress it but it didn't help, so she reached up to drum his ribs. Being as ticklish as he was, Shikamaru gave out and fell backwards pushing up on her shoulders to keep her off, but she was taller then him.

Taka stratled his chest and held his arms back above his head, against the ground. He felt his face go redder than it had ever been, even when he had that one big fever as a kid, and he was still clueless as to why.

"I win." Takara stuck her tongue out at him. "Now you have to teach me."

"Okay. . ." Shikamaru wanted to fade into the ground because that moment of adrenalin was gone and his common sense was returning, therefore the awkwardness of the situation was strangling him. And he didn't know anything more to say than "okay".

"Good!!" Taka beamed and popped off of him, leaving him to struggle with his thoughts and bright colored face.

"When do we start, sensei? Shika-sensei?" Through his flustered face, Shikamaru managed to grin.

"Tomorrow?"

"Yay!! Shika-sensei'll teach me how to be a genius!" she proclaimed to someone who wasn't there. "Thank you, Shikamaru. I wasn't having a good day earlier and you really cheered me up." Taka hugged him. In her embrace, she reached around and pinched his sides, making him yelp and pull back.

Shikamaru's man's ego at absolute zero. He felt stripped entirely of his pride, but oddly enough, he didn't feel that bad. And that worried him.

Before he could take the revenge he wasn't going to attempt, Takara ran away as fast as she could, throwing her book heavy messenger bad onto her shoulder.

"Buh-bye now!" Taka called to him. He just whispered a "goodbye" to her, even though it came out long after she was gone.

When Shikamaru went home that night his face was still glowing scarlet.

"Nara Shikamaru!! Can't you remember your curfew?! Do you have any idea how late it is?! And you know you should be training! The Ch--" Nara Yoshino was in the midst of greeting her only son as she always did, with a warm welcome of nags, but she saw something strange about him.

Instead of a tired, apathetic look of kill-me-now on his face, he seemed out of it and somewhere else. Not to mention the peculiar shade of cochineal staining his features. . .

"So you've been out lazing around and now you've caught a cold?! Shikamaru, how many times have I told you--" Yoshino yanked her son forward and felt his forward. Sure enough, it was very warm, but that wasn't what caught her off guard.

Normally when she went abrasive-Nazi mother on him he would let himself be putty and let her pull him around without a fight(because that was the last thing he wanted).

Now he did the same, and was limp to any wills of his own, but it was more like he was in some kind of trance. His eyes were wide like he was surprised by everything and he seemed to be lost in thought.

Taken aback, she just ordered him to bed. She threw him towards the stairs and he stumbled a bit and caught himself. Ghostlike, he drifted up the stairs.

"What was that?" Shikaku asked from the doorway he was leaning on.

"I think-- Shikamaru has a girlfriend."

_Sunset on the meadow,_

_The colors mesh with the two._

_When-- wait, WTF?!_

_GIRLFRIEND?!_

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

**ALERT! ALERT! ALERT FOR ALL THOSE WHO LIKE IMNP (that's I'm No Princess, n00b)!!**

**I'm planning to make videos on my Youtube account for the relationships in the story, as in all those with Takara(Na, Sas, Nej, Gaar, & Shi). How this relates to you is this:**

**If you enjoy drawing and are remotely good at it, I'm requesting that you be on my drawing committee(and I only need one person. That's all I'm looking for).**

**Sounds stupid, yes, but I need as much help as I can get. I suck at drawing. So I need someone who can:**

**1-Draw remotely well(Heck, I'd be happy with someone who could use Art to edit the anime pictures to have Taka in them).**

**2-Color them in nicely(colored pencils work).**

**3-Put up with my requests for specific situations in the pictures.**

**4-Send them to me efficiently. (I'm no slave driver, I can deal with delays. But I can't wait forever.**

**If you're interested, PM me for further instruction slash affirmation. :**

**And sorry, Domi-kun, I didn't include the description. I kinda forgot. So here's the description:**

**Hair reaches down to the bottom of the shoulder blade always in a ponytail that curls up a bit. Beige cargo pants with a pink tank top and beige top that looks like a Chunin vest cut in half horizontally. Beige fingerless gloves. Hot pink amethyst stud earrings shaped like hearts. Laced Greco-Roman tan sandals. Hot pink ninja headband worn around her waist like Ino's. And her weapon's pouch on her thigh has a crown for a button thing. (Thanks, Amaya-chan!)**

**Takara's face is heart shaped and she has very thick lips. She has a button nose! And she has more of tan skin(that's actually a bad thing in their time! You know how the Hyuga have all pale? That's a sign of being prestigious. And Taka is so not. Sorry, girl!) She has strong arms for a girl but slender wrists and ankles. She has very long legs and they make up a lot of her height. She has broad shoulders and hips. Big for her age! Not fat, though she'd like to think that.**


	33. Flowers And Powders

Takara took joy in smelling every single flower in the Yamanaka Flower Shop. She'd go there almost every week to see her friend, but the smells always seemed, even though she had smelled them all before.

"Say, Ino-chan, is there a flower that means sorry?" Ino was a fluent speaker of the language of flowers and Takara always loved to take part in such an elating thing. But of course little things of bright color and unique fragrance with secret messages in them would make her happy.

"There is. Why?" Ino went to get the hyacinths.

"Issi-kun and I got into a fight and I haven't said sorry yet," she confessed.

"That's a good idea. But why would a boy know what flowers mean?"

"Oh, I guess you're right." Taka prodded the irises. She giggled to herself. "You sound just like Shika-kun talking about man-woman things like that. He's funny that way. Are you where he gets it, or did you get it from him?"

"I guess I might pick up a few things from him. Yesterday I found myself calling training 'troublesome'." Ino picked out five of the prettiest purple flowers for Taka to give to Isao. "So what's the the sudden Shikamaru fascination? You guys dating?" She gave her friend sly look.

"Oh, no no way. We're just friends. And he's my sensei, too. He's teaching me to play shogi!"

"Yeah, that's the only thing besides just sitting around that he'll choose to do. How did you decide on that, though?" Ino still wanted something juicy.

"I've had it kinda hard these last few days. He really helped to cheer me up. Say, what do you think of Haruno Sakura?"

"Sakura? You mean Bill-Board Brow? She's just in my way, trying to take Sasuke-kun away from me. You know how I feel about her. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, well I-- hey, Sakura-chan!"

The said kunoichi entered the shop and went to browsing the potted plants with a smile and a wave.

"You know, buying Sasuke-kun potted flowers is like saying he'll be in the hospital forever."

Sakura stiffened. "Who says I'm going to see Sasuke-kun?"

"Don't try to hide anything from me, Forehead Girl. And I'm coming with you. Mom, I'm going out!!"

"Okay!--" Yamanaka Chiyo called from the back room.

"I'll go, too. I wanna see Suke-kun."

"'Suke-kun'?" the rivals pardoned in unison.

"Well-- isn't it a good nickname?" Takara rubbed the back of her head in nervousness, not realizing that it was a habit she had picked up from Naruto.

They both gave her skeptical looks, but dismissed it.

Sakura and Ino went to arguing and blathering over the flowers that they would bring and who would win Sasuke. All Taka thought of was that he wasn't a prize to be won, and that he'd choose whoever he wanted.

But she thought that it was best kept to herself.

Instead she went to choosing the flowers she would bring him. Maybe an Adonis? Those meant the recollection of life's pleasures. It would apply to the reviving of memories that had occurred the yesterday.

Or maybe a an amaranth, meaning unchangeable, like their friendship. No, even she thought that was cheesy. (But then, would he even notice?)

Abor vitae meaning true friendship, or a camellia meaning excellence and steadfastness, just as he was?"

No, none of these worked. . .

Wait, a chrysanthemum! That would work! They meant "you are a wonderful friend", and they were red just like Sasuke's favorite color(or at least it had been back when they were friends)!

As the girls left with the flowers in hand(Taka having to carry much more because of her bouquet for Isao), Ino noticed something that disturbed her greatly.

She noticed that Takara was bringing a red chrysanthemum for Sasuke, which meant "I love you".

. . .

_'It's a good thing I don't have to go take care of Suke-kun yet.' _Takara thought._ 'I'll just wait until Ino-chan and Sakura-chan have gone home before I do. I think I'll wait ten years or so before I tell either of them about this. . .'_

When they reached the Konoha Hospital and asked if Uchiha Sasuke could be visited, to Taka's surprise, the nurse said yes. Apparently he had been moved out of the intensive care unit and into the healing facilities.

But when they went to see him, Sasuke wasn't in his bed. He wasn't in his room at all, and his clothes were gone. The blurb of panic went off in Takara's mind. Did Kakashi know about this?

They laid their vases on the bedside table for Sasuke if he returned. Then, on Sakura's request, they went to see Rock Lee.

To their shock and dismay, he wasn't there either. They did see him, however, doing push ups outside the window.

"Stop! You need to heal!" The nurse reached out to pick the straining Lee up and take him back to his room, but he wanted other wise.

"Please! Leave me alone!" he ever so politely barked.

The overreached look on anguish on his face remained for a moment, and then his arm gave out beneath him.

There was a moment of forlorn silence between the girls as the nurse went to get a stretcher and someone to help.

"Why-- do boys always over exert themselves?"

"I don't know, I'm not a boy," Ino said, but it sounded a bit like a mournful beg. Taka was to tragically transfixed on Rock Lee to notice.

"Sorry. . ."

There was more silence, but it wasn't the kind that you broke.

. . .

Later that night, when Isao came home, he found a bouquet of strange violet flowers on his porch. At dinner, his mother identified that they were purple hyacinths, and in the language of flowers, they meant "I'm sorry, please forgive me".

He knew who they were from.

. . .

When Takara went to see Shikamaru it was still late afternoon. After eighteen frustrating games, Taka decided that she wasn't going to win, so she challenged Shikamaru to a spar.

He accepted after declaring it troublesome.

First Takara lunged at him, and of course he dodged her. When he had his back to her mid jump, she skillfully pulled out a vile of yellow paralysis powder.

It was a simple strategy: she would fling some at him, and he would be frozen in place. It usually lasted about fifteen minutes per pinch of the powder.

Taka did try to throw some and hit him in the front of his neck, because he had turned to face her, with his hands in the rat seal.

An unknown force, much stronger then her, pulled Takara's hands into the rat seal, as well.

_'Is this the--?!'_

"Shadow Possession Jutsu," he affirmed. But then all his movements ceased, starting at his neck and spreading to his torso and face.

Fifteen silent, entrapped minutes later the paralysis wore off.

"A paralysis powder? Like the sleeping powder you used in the Preliminaries?"

He smirked as her expression strained in frustration that she couldn't respond.

Shikamaru leaned back, not resting on anything, but Takara leaning on a tree. He took out some wire and tied it around himself loosely so it would bind Taka to the tree.

He released the jutsu, but the blonde was still strapped to the tree.

He went up looked her right in the eyes, their noses nearly touching. Two fingers he jabbed into her side and squeaked.

"I win."

And with that, Shikamaru left, glad he had one the day.

Two minutes later, long after he was out of earshot, Taka called:

"Come back here! You have to untie me!"

_Friendships forever,_

_Boys are whatever._

_They said they'd break never,_

_But they're just about sever._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

**ALERT! ALERT! ALERT FOR ALL THOSE WHO LIKE IMNP (that's I'm No Princess, n00b)!!**

**I'm planning to make videos on my Youtube account for the relationships in the story, as in all those with Takara(Naru, Sasu, Neji, Gaara, & Shika). How this relates to you is this:**

**If you enjoy drawing and are remotely good at it, I'm requesting that you be on my drawing committee(and I only need one person. That's all I'm looking for).**

**Sounds stupid, yes, but I need as much help as I can get. I suck at drawing. So I need someone who can:**

**1-Draw remotely well(Heck, I'd be happy with someone who could use Art to edit the anime pictures to have Taka in them).**

**2-Color them in nicely(colored pencils work).**

**3-Put up with my requests for specific situations in the pictures.**

**4-Send them to me efficiently. (I'm no slave driver, I can deal with delays. But I can't wait forever.**

**If you're interested, PM me for further instruction slash affirmation. :**


	34. A Stupid Excuse

Sorry!

In case you haven't noticed, I haven't updated in forever. (Like five days!)

I know I've been trying to get on a chapter every day, but that will not happen now because school starts tomorrow.

Don't worry, it's not over, and I WILL finish, but the updates will be more like once a week now. I still have plenty ideas, and our favorite guys will NOT be leaving any time soon, but yeah-- school sucks.

The probable update date will be every Saturday. No promises, though.

I am having a bit of a writer's block with words, but the ideas are still there! It will continue. It WILL!

And again, sorry, sorry, sorry!


	35. You Tripped Me!

The next few days progressed like so: Takara would wake up at 7:00(that being her 5:00) and go to train, though sometimes she would drop by the Uchiha compound to see if Sasuke was there, but he never was.

All the memories Takara had of the Uchiha clan land were good: she could recall picnics out on the dock, the wind gently swaying the trees and the giggles of children echoing over the area.

Taka also could remember, a few days after befriending Sasuke, that she took a pair of scissors to her hair because she wanted to appear more Snow White like, and therefore wanted to have short hair.

Of course her parents threw a fit, and after a few of those well deserved beatings, a stylist evened out the unruly trim.

It was still a treasured memory, though, because of the freaked out look on Sasuke's face. When she asked him if it was cute, he blushed, crossed his arms, and called her ugly. They fought for a while, but it was still treasured.

So many good recollections, but they all seemed so distant. The other day when she met her friend for the first time after so long she felt them again, but they left when he did.

After Takara dropped by his house to see if anyone was present, she would, as was previously stated, train until lunch, when she might meet Sakura, Ino, or Hinata for lunch, and then would train, sometimes with Kichiro or Isao.

In the late afternoon, her favorite time of day, Taka would go see _him_: the one she had learned to like much more than she thought she would.

When Takara imagined going into battle she thought of offense, defense, or retreat. Through shogi, Shikamaru had taught her so much more, and not only in the ways of strategy.

She learned how addicting the clouds could be to watch, and that they had more of a Hakuna Matata effect then she thought was possible. She could watch them for hours and hours and not even feel a moment go by.

She learned that one night, when she was so engulfed with her conversation with him that she followed him on his way home to finish it, that after a meeting with his mother, that he shared blood with the epitome of insanity.

It never crossed her mind that anyone could have a more eccentric, nagging mother then her own, but she was wrong. Shikamaru had a crazy mom.

That aside, she learned even more.

She learned that during the full moon, his normally honey brown eyes shown of colors you had to look hard to see.

There were rivers of light light green and beautiful blue, shades and hues she (embarrassingly) just gaped at. She never knew how amazing his eyes were.

What Shikamaru learned was on a completely different level.

Instead of attaining information, he stumbled upon a flustering problem: that the presence of this strange girl always made him-- awkward. And comfortable. Awkwardly comfortable.

And to be around her made him happy.

He didn't like that.

Whatever the problem was he couldn't figure, no matter how long he thought about it, and he nearly lost a game of shogi to her trying to figure it out.

A triumphant Taka-happy dance followed, but a move from the Nara prodigy shut down her chance of winning. A pouting Taka- pout followed.

What was this all, then? What was the strange squirming, yearning feeling?

He thought he knew, but he was afraid to say it.

_What is this feeling,_

_So sudden and new?_

_I can't help but feel it_

_Whenever I see you,_

**AUTHOR'S CORNER:**

**Hate me, it's an unimportant update. And yeah, that's a Wicked lyric! **

**Lots O' Love, KittyLo**


	36. Trying To Run, But You Can't

Shikamaru stood, weary from training, in the Konoha Hospital. Asuma had been working him to the bone with training all day(and all the days before, for that matter), but now it was going to pay off. This was what he had been waiting for, to see her.

He tried to prepare himself, though preparation seemed so unneeded with all that had gone on. What could he possibly need to prepare in seeing her, after they'd seen each other every day for the last two weeks? How could he actually still feel uncomfortable around her? It made no sense.

A plan, that was what he needed. Forget the reason, he just needed a plan.

A fairly stupid idea that only someone with limited female experience would think drifted into his mind as a nurse ferrying a tray of meals passed him, as he was leaning on the wall. He shot it right down, along with some others.

Then he recalled a conversation that sat in his subconscious memory: it was a sunny noon, on a mission with his team before Chunin Exams. . . yeah, he was leaning on a tree, trying to keep from picking up the litter by a creek in the forest, like he was supposed to be doing.

Ino had yet again gotten onto Choji for not being more conservative in his eating habits. She went onto a rant about what girls preferred in men, how they didn't like fat guys or something like that. But there was more then that.

Yes. . . girls liked Sasuke, she mentioned that quite a lot. But more then that.

Girls liked guys to be confident. It was a must. And cockiness was a plus. Edginess was a rush. . . yes, it was coming back.

Ino went on and on about how she was so intoxicated by his aloof attitude. . . so, to get Takara(wait, when did he decide on that? he was just trying to talk to her) he would have to behave like Sasuke?

Wait, he didn't want to be like Sasuke. Wait, did Takara like Sasuke like every other girl?

All the raging thoughts seemed to disappear when the giggly-mooded Taka came out from room 7-15, where she had delivered a package of various medicines to Old Lady Takushi.

With a wave and a pleasantry, she turned around to immediately meet honey brown eyes.

A pained smile rippled her face, but it didn't look real. And her face was all red. Was she upset to see him? She made a beeline towards him. His throat went dry.

"H-H-H-H-- Good m-morning, Sh-Shikamaru. G-Gotta go!!" She waved her hand behind her head and speed-walked down the hall. On a sharp turn down around a corner she even tripped over her ankles.

Taka gave Shikamaru a coy smile . All he could manage was an apparent look of astonishment. What in the--

She picked up herself and ran down the hall.

**In The Mind Of Takara**

Taka felt beyond embarrassed. Unlike every other day for a time that seemed amazing, she didn't want to see Shikamaru. Not now. Not ever.

Well, that wasn't true. She wanted to see him. She just didn't want him to see her. What would he think? It bothered her how that question never came up before.

She couldn't stand it: these thoughts were just too consuming.

And there was one thought more consuming then any of the rest. . . a little voice screamed whenever Shikamaru came to mind, and that happened a lot.

The first time was the night before when she was sleeping, in the middle of a good princess-esque dream, when all of a sudden she awoke from something that kept knocking at her brain.

Taka thought she was going insane, and she had to hold her pillow up to her head to keep from screaming! She bit hard into it, and involuntarily, spouted out something so nonsensical she couldn't wrap her mind around it:

"I think I love you!!"

What the dream was she couldn't remember, but she did recall a white dress, a field on a cliff, and a diamond ring.

She went back to sleep, a bit confused but overwhelmingly tired. When she woke up in the morning, she had the imprint of having been happy, but it was as though that happiness was gone somehow. And that turned to a desperate yearning for something she couldn't quite put her finger on.

That feeling Takara didn't know how to deal with, so she just pushed it back into herself. She'd hide it to herself, and never talk about it.

And try not to shout it when she saw him across the hall. (Though she barely did!)

That stupid phrase, "I think I love you!"

It was hard, but she suppressed the enveloping feeling again, running out of the Konoha Hospital with red all over her face the boy who plagued her thoughts behind her, confused.

This day would be hard to repress, but she would manage.

Later that night, after a day of less severe training, the sun had set and she was late to visit Shikamaru. She planned on going to see him, yes, but she wanted to hold out as long as she could.

Shikamaru sighed out on the field they always met in: she wasn't coming, was she?

On her flustered way to the field, Takara heard a commotion coming from a rooftop.

She jumped up to it, just in time to see Gaara and one Sound-nin whom she wasn't familiar with.

Taka didn't know the nature of the situation, but she heard very clearly what Gaara had to say.

"When there's a full moon. . ." He lowered his face to shadow his eyes. ". . . it's blood boils."

The following was too graphic for Takara's eyes to take.

From what she thought was Gaara erupted a strange monster, something unlike anything she had ever seen. It was horrific.

The swerving terror, half human, half other, took it's gigantic claw swiped into the roof of the wooden building, obliterating the helpless Sound-nin without second thought.

All Takara could do was gape with her eyes wide and her mouth ajar. It was wretchedly bizarre. What exactly was he?!

The answer to that question. . . Takara had no idea what it was. She couldn't think about that. She just wanted to scream.

In rest and proud of its kill, the savage beast that was Gaara shrank back to a more regular form for a bit, and turned, in shock, to see Taka.

There was tense silence.

"H--How could you?! Gaara-- you, what are you?! He-- how could you take his life?! What makes you think you can do that?! You. . . you. . ."

Tears now pouring from her unready-to-witness-death eyes, Takara's knees shook violently beneath her.

Monsters were always things in fairy tales. Wicked things, but so far away. There were always more real dangers to worry about, but this, this, was unbelievably sinister. And it was REAL.

"You monster!!" Fear and resent filled the eyes that once accepted so warmly.

Gaara cringed in pain: whether physical or emotional, it was hard to tell. They were becoming the same.

He grabbed his head as though it were going to crack.

With furiously fast sand snaking towards her, Takara was defenseless. It held harder then anything she had ever felt, in a deadly grip.

A few excruciating cracks, and everything went dark.

_Day is done,_

_Gone the sun._

_Blood hath run._

_Oh, Gaara-kun. . ._


	37. Hm, Bizarre

A man stood above Takara, sledge hammering her head with his muscular arms.

No, not really, but it felt like that.

It felt like hours of excrutiating pain while just barely hearing the fuzzy blur of hospital interaction.

Takara summoned as much strength as she could and opened her eyes to see a sight that perturbed her greatly.

A little girl, a brunette ponytail drooping glumly off of her head, was crying into her small hands. A woman hand a hand on her head and her eyes were swollen red. A man with dark hair was speaking to them with a solemn expression on his face.

Takara closed her eyes and tried her best to close out all the pains, emotional and physical.

She didn't know why, but it felt like she had been hurt. And not just on the outside.

. . .

Taka had sustained many nearly fatal injuries but luckily one Sand Village team's sensei had brought her in before life could escape her.

Weeks had passed and she remained in coma, through the Sound invasion of Konoha and a few more weeks after.

With sheer luck and a heavenly blessing she came out with only a blank fuzz of memory as to what occurred during the Chunin Exams.

Osaka Hira, a nurse who every day manned the counter of the Konoha Hospital's visitor center, noticed the most peculiar of visitors coming to see the young girl in room NPT-13.

Of course her father oversaw her daily, for he had a job in the hospital and made sure she had the best care and the best treatment. Then her mother, who had always been famously strong. It hurt Hira a lot to see such a sullen look in the socialite's normally bright eyes. The other daughter came, too, and always left crying.

Once, and only once, came an extremely handsome boy-- wait, it was that one Uchiha boy, who survived the terrible massacre-- yeah, it was him. Hm, strange.

He earlier then any others, after the family, and she had to turn him away because it was too early for public visitors, as required Konoha Hospital safety regulations. He frustratedly accepted it and asked simply that a white parcel that he had with him be given to her.

Of course, in accordance with the safety regulations, Hira was required to look through it.

It was a Fairy Tale book.

Hm, odd.

Not long after him came a blonde boy in orange-- that Nine-Tailed Fox boy. It was hard for Hira to look him in the eyes, but she found it hard to wretch like she thought she would in his exuberant yet caring presence.

Hm, surprising.

It was hard, however, to tell him that public visitors were not allowed. Apparently he had some mission and had to leave and wanted to see her before he left, whether she was awake or not.

It took quite a bit of convincing-- and a two Chunin removal-- to get him to leave.

Hm, feisty.

A few hours after him came a Hyuga boy-- Hyuga Neji of the Side Branch, he was. He was silent and reclusive, as per usual, but there was something different about him from the last time she had seen him, while healing his team mate. He was softer. . . kinder.

Neji came and asked to see her. Hira had to turn him away though in her heart she wanted to encourage this more human side she was seeing of him.

He nodded and left, hiding any and all emotions from the world.

Hm, unusual.

Haruno Sakura came, also not long after, woefully asking to see her friend. Hira had met Sakura before when she went to see Sasuke, so she knew to be kind and gentle when denying her entrance, for she had a tender heart.

They actually had a conversation, for the sake of cheering the poor girl up a bit(she looked so sad sometimes!). Hira inquired of Sakura's mother state, how things were going in her family and missions and with boys.

The conversation led to the visits Sakura had paid to Sasuke while he was in the hospital-- then Hira raised the memory she had of Sakura and Takara both coming to see him.

Sakura didn't know that Takara was going to see Sasuke, apparently. Well, Hira told Sakura about how Takara was the one Kakashi appointed to bring Sasuke his medicine and to watch over him and guard him from time to time.

Sakura didn't know about any of that at all.

Hm, curious.

Yamanka Ino, daughter of Yamanka Chiyo, also came to visit Takara. She wasn't as caring and heart felt as the other visitors. She seemed almost angry, but-- no, why on earth would she be?

Takara still couldn't have public visitors, though, so Ino had to leave.

Hm, suspicious.

The young Hyuga heir, Hyuga Hinata, came to visit as well. She was meek, though that was a given, and she meekly asked to see Takara meekly. She was meek in her rejection and meekly thanked Hira. She meekly left with a meek look on her meek face.

Hm, redundant.

The most fervent visitor, however, who visited every day to see if visitors were yet allowed, was the Nara boy, Shikaku-san's son. Like his father, Shikamaru had a lethargic expression tattooed to his face but Hira could see so much more mixed in that she wouldn't have been able to count them all on her digits.

Concern, annoyance, duty, care, anxiety, affection, solemnity, worry, relevance, and many, many, MANY more.

Hm, bizarre.

_They come to visit, _

_Those who love you as you are_

_But secrets spill over. . ._

_Hm, bizarre._

**. . . AUTHOR'S CORNER. . .**

**Love it? Hate it? I wanna know! Review me, baby!**

**PS: Sorry it's so short. But hey, I updated, didn't I?**


	38. Wakey, Wakey

Everything seemed fuzzy. There didn't appear to be reason for anything, she just walked with obligation to nothing. There wasn't any reason to it.

Takara just stumbled down the hospital hallway trying to do something she wasn't sure of.

The vague hallway opened up to a waiting room and Takara's feet fell from underneath her. She was kept from the ground, though, by someone she didn't realize was there.

She was still tired and was close to falling back to sleep but whatever force kept her from colliding with the floor shook her mercilessly.

Her head just bobbed back and forth with it.

. . .

Kaori-sensei sighed like her regular strained self but was seriously overjoyed to see her only female student alive. "Stop that, Isao, you're gonna snap her neck."

"What's wrong with her?! Is she coma walking or something?! Why can't she talk to me!? This isn't right!! She's ruined forever, ah!! We've lost her! She'll never be the same again!!"

A limp hand came surprisingly hard across Isao's face. "Shuh-udup. . . " A drunken order came from her barely conscience mouth. "Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii'm sleepy. . ." Takara collapsed onto the floor and let out a medley of pig-like snores.

"No, I think she's just tired." Kichiro was careful to stay away from the girl while she was in such a state, for he had suffered a similar occurrence while on a mission so many weeks ago.

Lesson learned: Trying to wake up Taka is BAD.

But, however painful that memory was, the overwhelming relief in knowing that his teammate was okay was more then enough to sooth that little bit of a grudge.

He couldn't wait to tell her!

. . .

Two hours of lazy sleep, a quickly engulfed meal, a situation explanation, and a cute clothing crisis later Takara was out of the hospital and again walking without purpose.

According to information received from a nurse her mother was on a business trip, her sister was in school, and her father was in the midst of surgery. So what Takara did was simple to her: she went to the Field.

It was strange that her mind was working that way-- hey, maybe the drugs hadn't worn off-- but she wanted to finish doing what she had been doing before, the night that she was going to see Shikamaru in the first place.

She arrived sooner then expected and immediately went to thinking. It was mind boggling that she had really _been in a coma_. It seemed so cliche.

Should she have been happy that she lived? Should she have been isolated for missing out on so much? Should she have felt betrayed? By. . . she forced her thoughts to a mighty halt.

Gaara.

. . .

. . .

. . .

Shikamaru did something completely radical, something he hadn't done in so long: he didn't go to check the hospital.

Everyday he went to see her and her situation never changed. He didn't want to give up but the reality was closing in fast.

She was never going to wake up, was she?

Instead of going to the hospital he went straight to the field. His gaze seemed to fall without reason(I'm sensing a pattern) onto the horizon in front of him.

Grass. Grass. Flower. Grass. Grass. Grass. Takara. Grass.

. . .

However genius he was, it took a moment for that to register.

He stood in a moment, soaking in utter awe, at something he thought he would never see again.

A blonde ditz sprawled over the grassy field staring up at the clouds. Only one thing was missing. Him.

Instead of running and spazzing out like a certain blonde who shall remain nameless would, he took casual strides, drawing absolute pleasure from each step, and sat down quietly. She was too into her thoughts to notice.

. . .

Five minutes passed and she didn't notice him. Shikamaru was beginning to become antsy. Had some medicine not worn off? Was she ignoring him?

He sat up and looked down on Takara to see that she was sleeping.

Funny, she had been sleeping for at least a month, and now she just wanted to sleep more.

But then, suddenly, he had an idea that made his face burn with heat.

Taka always loved princesses, like she had often expressed, and seeing her sleeping in what seemed like an eternal coma he could only think of one fairy tale: Sleeping Beauty.

On many occasions Takara told him of her opinions of the princess's stories, Sleeping Beauty being one of those, while he half-listened and half-heard her.

In the end, in what she told him was her favorite part, the Prince leaned down to kiss her and when their lips met she woke from her nightmares.

While he was battling this thought, he was sinking down towards her without realizing it.

Twelve inches, eleven inches, ten inches, seven inches, five inches, two inches, one inch. . .

When it came down to four centimeters Shikamaru's torso shook in shock when he heard a "HEY!" from behind him.

He flipped over and looked up at Naruto who had his arms crossed angrily.

"What were you doing?!"

"I wasn't doing anything." Shikamaru's mind searched every corner of his conscious for an excuse. "I was looking at her to see if she was okay." Naruto's glare remained skeptical. Shikamaru, not wanting to continue looking Naruto in the eyes, turned to look back at Takara as though still examining her. "Her breath doesn't smell of any sedative drugs, so I'm assuming she's just napping."

"Oh." Naruto's arms dropped to his sides and he pretended to know what a sedative drug was.

Shikamaru turned an indignant eye on Naruto because he just realized that this blonde dropout had trespassed on his and Taka's special place.

"What are you doing here?"

"I heard Takara got out of the hospital and I came looking for her." Naruto came to her side and looked down her. His eyes were full of care and frustration and Shikamaru took this into careful consideration.

"Well she's okay," Shikamaru affirmed, wanting for Naruto to leave.

"I'm going to wait until she wakes up." Naruto crossed his legs and sat down beside her.

"You don't have to do that." Shikamaru was feeling a green sting of jealousy and the red bite of anger.

"I'm gonna wait for her to wake up."

"I think you should leave. You can come see her later."

"Are you trying to get rid of me?" Naruto was getting angry as well.

"No, I'm just--" Shikamaru didn't know what to say and Naruto proceeded to get angrier.

Takara blinked her eyes open. She looked up through blurred vision to see the aggravated faces of two people she could find nothing but good feelings for.

Her next action was committed upon pure impulse, like an involuntary reflex as swift as the beat of her heart.

Takara snapped up and wrapped her arms around the necks of Shikamaru and Naruto.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

_Comas and comrades,_

_Life is a mess._

_But now she awakens,_

_The sleeping princess._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER**

**To anyone who's reading this, I love you. Really, really, really do! So loyal, I know I haven't updated in the longest time.**

**But don't worry, mis amigos, check out my profile to see what the IMNP plans are. I'm far from finished and I'm just short on time.**

**If you're bored, go check out my new Naruto story, Konoha Shinobi Preparatory High School: Interactive, which I have planned to make much easier to write and I will be writing it in the fiction time lapses.**

**Oh, and for those who read The Obsession by Desert.Moon-sama, I put that "Shudduuuuup," in there for her, in you-know-who's honor.**

**Rest, Dear Prince, and may legions of angels sing thee to thy rest. **

**cries then dies**


	39. A Neji Story: Choice Of Fate

Neji could not sleep at all. He could only think.

How many years? How many years did he spend staring at this ceiling above his bed, thinking of his raw unadulterated hatred for the Main Branch of the Hyuga family?

Too many years, that was how many.

And now all of that was gone, now that he knew the truth of his father's death. That day of the Third Chunin Exam, now a week ago, had such great impact on his life.

He was now free; a bird free from a cage of resentment and contempt that had held him for the whole of his life.

But now the question was, what to do? What to do with the life that he had so put off?

With the accurate eyes in his mind, even more sharp those he had inherited from his blood limit, he scanned all of memories for something. . . something of meaning.

As soon as he opened himself he found that there were memories he could no longer repress, so filling up up and now running over.

They were his most colorful memories, those of training sessions by the river and those of ice cream cones in the park. So bright in comparison to the dark black and bland white of his other memories that he lay for a moment only recalling them, like movie that had more connection to his life then anything in reality.

Facts came running back, as well, because on reflex he always collected the information he had. It was his way of thought.

_"Princesses are my favorite," _she had told him. _"I wish I was a princess."_

_"That is something foolish to say. You are going to be a kunoichi, so you shouldn't idolize such childish ideas," _he had told her. He then winced, the only physical reaction he had to his thoughts as he lay in bed. Now looking back on it he could only recall harsh criticisms he had given her.

He was cold, heartless, cruel in his words and actions. Every memory he had was of his unkindness towards her.

But then, why did she stay around him? Why did she come every day to the place where he trained? Even more, why did she bring bento lunches for him?

It was his final bitter dismissal that sent her away for good. He could remember that memory the most vividly, though he really didn't want to.

But what? What was it that kept her coming to him every day? He collected all of the information he had in his mind but came up with nothing. And though this meaning confounded him, another question came straight to his mind on no will of his own.

What could get her to come to him again?

A very colorful memory of her was one that repeated itself every day for an entire year, if it wasn't more.

Since dawn he would have been training, practicing his gentle fist against a tree, and then he would see from behind him the approaching girl that came to bother him every day. When she was but a few feet away, coming through a sparse of trees and into his training clearing, he would turn and face her in his good manners. He would meet face to face with a red cherub smile and red ribbon-ed half ponytail. She would set down their lunches with a kind greeting and they would begin their training session.

It was funny, in an ironic way. No matter how he shunned her with his words, there came a day when he stopped bringing his own lunches and would just eat the ones she brought.

At the time he thought of it only as the reasonable thing to do, because he brought a lunch for himself every day and she brought two, one for him and one for her. If one lunch was always wasted, then what was the point of making his own lunch when he could have one that she brought for him?

But maybe it was more.

That she came every day, that she brought him lunch even though he had his own, that she smiled the way she did, maybe it all meant something beyond that of simply training together.

Of course it did. He couldn't lie to himself that it was otherwise.

What if he went to their training spot again? Would she be there?

Of course she wouldn't.

And what-- what if the Main Branch found out? He was still not permitted to be around the girl that distracted him too much from his purpose as Hinata's protector.

He was not permitted to be around Takara at all, because then he would only want to be around her more.

When he finished that thought, he realized that his legs were moving him forward to the destination he knew he needed be at. His mind fought him on it, but he moved down the Hyuga residence's halls to find Hiashi where he sat meditating in the garden.

After of few minutes of searching, Neji found the Hyuga's Leader.

"Oko-san." Hiashi addressed Neji in a firm yet casual way that surprised him a lot, meaning "child", in kind reference to him as his nephew.

"Oji-san," Neji tried. Neji didn't know that Hiashi was trying out that name as well, just as apprehensively as him.

"Oji-san," Neji said, this time with something to follow it. "I have a request." He wasn't sure how else to put it.

"What is that?" Hiashi still didn't move from his position in cross-legged meditation.

"I would like to request. . . a girl." That came out rather poorly.

"A girl?" There wasn't much volume to Hiashi's response but there was a lot of surprise.

"Yes." Neji managed not to stutter.

"In what way?" Hiashi's curiosity was truly peeked.

"I would like to be allowed her presence." Neji managed not to break his sentence.

"That you may have." Hiashi's curiosity was gone and he turned to meditate again.

"But, that isn't all."

"What else?"

"Do I have permission from the Hyuga council?" Neji knew that it couldn't be that simple.

"What do you mean by that?" His eyebrows furrowed.

"The Hyuga Council denied my being allowed around her for distraction purposes a while ago."

"How long ago?"

"Four years ago."

Hiashi thought for a moment. "I recall that." He thought for another moment, a long, long moment, making Neji feel like he was eternally sliding off of a steep slope to his imminent death. "The child of. . . Shizute?"

"Yes." Neji swallowed hard, accepting a feeling of fate that he thought he was finally rid of.

"You are permitted to associate with her."

A moment of silence passed and Hiashi expected the conversation to be over after Neji thanked him, but Neji was still in shock and puzzlement.

"What?" was all he could pardon.

"She is the daughter of Shizute Fuyumi?" Neji only nodded but with the Byakugan, Hiashi saw it. "The Hyuga has recently made a contract with Fuyumi-san. She will be providing our clan with herbs for our medical examination unit and we will be paying her handsomely." He turned to face Neji. "Because of this union of families I have now decided that your associating with their daughter is no longer forbidden."

Quite unattractively, Neji's jaw hung down, ajar. It was something that he couldn't comprehend. Then his pale lips came together in a fulfilled smile.

"Thank you, Oji-san." And like that, Neji left down the hall, _not _kicking his heels together like he wanted to as he turned a corner and maintaining his dignity, while he didn't realize how tight his ribs were with sheer joy.


	40. Friends And Family

"A dream is a wish your heart makes. . ." People stared. "When you're fast asleep!"

Takara sped up that warm summer morning and sang to herself as she checked off Father, Mother, and Nii-chan on her to-visit checklist in her list journal.

After meeting Shikamaru and Naruto in the meadow(those two she had already checked off) to day previous, she went home to find her mother waiting for her.

It was unusual and uncomfortable for her to see her mother, who had so proven herself to be beyond strong, cry as she did, but Takara was more then relieved, much more then that, to see her mother.

She went back to the hospital, with her mother's arm held tight around her, to see her father and to tell him the news that he had probably already heard, that his daughter had awoken from a few month coma. Because he wasn't a supporter of PDAs(public displays of affection), Taka's father was not the one to cast the first hug.

They met in a crowded hospital hallway and it was silent with them for a moment, but when Chika came in screaming, crying, smiling, laughing, shrieking, and grabbing, the family love-fest began.

Chika hugged Takara, Takara fell on Fumiya, Tako caught Fumiya, they all hugged. However obnoxious it seemed to those passing by, it was a reunion of a family that had so long been apart.

For the first time in her life, Takara saw her mother ruin her makeup, without making any attempt to clear up her face. There was a lot of crying.

They went together back home, where Fumiya prepared a terribly crisp meal. They didn't notice and all ate it together, Takara for the first time enjoying her mother's cooking.

Takara was further updated on what had gone on in her out time. Especially so be Chika, who painted every last specification of their time apart with excruciating detail.

As she cuddled against her father on the family room sofa, eyelids falling over the memory-filled room, Takara was again reminded how much she loved her family. She couldn't imagine living without them.

. . .

Now she was making the turn down 12th Street, in the suburban area of Konoha. Next on the list for a visit was Isao.

Takara knocked on the blue door and it was answered by a woman in a yellow apron, with a confused look on her face.

"Can I help you?"

"Yes m'am. Is Issi-kun home?"

"Issi-kun? . . . oh, you mean Isao." The woman gasped. "I know you! You're that sweet little girl who left those flowers on our porch!"

"Oh-- Oh yeah, I did. . ." Takara rubbed the back of her neck, in a habit that had she picked up from Naruto.

"Come in, come in. I was just baking cookies." The smiling woman, with a large mess of curls with a dark color like Isao's, waved her in and took her into a neatly furnished living room.

The table was clean, the rug was precise, and a bowl of fresh fruit sat on a counter without purpose, other then to make it look nice.

Takara sat down and soon found a tray of warm, smushy, melty chocolate chip cookies in front of her, tormenting her with its toothsome aroma.

Much to her elation, the roundest and most perfect of them appeared inches from her mouth, in the grip five flawlessly manicured fingers.

Taka, of course, opened her mouth and allowed in the sweet. And oh, it was sweet. The pastry had sublime delight that streaked luscious euphoria across her palate like a thousand dancing ballerinas with chocolate chips for ballet flats.

And it wasn't burnt!

Before Takara could swallow, she found another cookie pressed up against her lips. To be polite, she opened up and ate that one, too.

And the next one. And the next one. And the next one. And the next one.

Around the seventh cookie Takara was beginning to gag. She swallowed hard and gestured the woman to stop, but she didn't quite catch it.

Around the fifteenth cookie, Isao came into his living room to get a snack and found his mother killing Takara.

"Mom!! What're you doing??!!" His eyes resembled the dish plates that sat pristinely set in the kitchen.

"Hm? Oh, there you are, Isao. I'm just letting our guest try my new recipe. Would you like some?"

"Mom, you're gonna kill her!" Isao ran to Takara(after skillfully grabbing the cookie his mother was holding and stuffing it into his mouth) and performed the Hemlick maneuver on her. A mushy glop of cookies were thrown onto the once clean table.

"Oh my, what a mess! I'll go get a cloth." The nearly insane woman went into the kitchen to do so.

"Uck-- augh--" Takara choked up the once-delicious remains. "Th--Thank you, Issi-kun. I was in a bit of a situation there, your mom's cookies--" She stopped herself and stared at him for a moment.

In unison, they hugged each other with rib-snapping tautness.

. . .

After their reunion, Isao pulled away and refused to hug her again. He found it the only way that he could reassert his masculinity. That didn't stop Taka from embracing the machoism right out of him, though.

Isao told her of the missions she missed. He didn't forget to mention how hard and annoying they were without her to share in the work. It was Isao's way of saying how much he missed her, Taka knew, and she gave him a hug for it.

He had to wrestle her off of him.

When she made her leave, after being so encouraged by her teammate, she checked off Isao and made her way to visit Kichi-kun.

. . .

When she got to Kichiro's house, a particularly nice apartment building, she received an intimidatingly empty echo when she knocked on the door. Though she would have normally thought against it, her desire to see Kichiro drove her to intrude upon the threshold. It was surely empty, she thought, until she found a dark-haired man meditating in a beige room, without any furniture.

Taka had mistaken him for Kichiro, but he larger, and exuded an aura of absolute power. His chakra energy nearly charred her hair.

She cracked the door open and looked in at him. He had a white meditation tunic and brown hair like Kichiro's. He opened one annoyed eye but didn't turn around to see her, so she assumed that he was unaware.

"Excuse me, sir?"

"How did you get in?" He was on his feet immediately, but Takara had scarcely seen him move. But of course. He was a shinobi.

"What?"

"How did you get in?" This sounded like more of a demand. A pissed off one.

"Well---" Takara knew that she had done something wrong in trespassing, but. . . "Kichi-kun--"

" 'Kichi-kun' Are you referring to my son? How is it that you are so disrespectful?" Now the man seemed just angry, though his tone was more stern. He took a step back with once foot, preparing a battle stance, but he didn't really intend to fight her, did he?

"Well---"

"You listen to me, child. I don't know who you are, but trespassing into my home is unacceptable. I don't care how you are associated with my son." He looked her up and down. "Obviously you are a part of no great family. Are you as weak as you are unimportant? That hitai-ate is disgraced by you."

"I---" Takara felt that she was in no place to defend herself, neither in argument or in combat.

"You're going to be very sorry for intruding on my training session." Haraguroi knew by his common sense that he would later pay for slaughtering a young girl. He would get into more trouble than he would like to imagine, but at that point in time, the overwhelming, powerful urge to unleash his contained energy was too strong.

And the voice of that Dragon. . . it tempted him. His will was stepped over.

Takara took a step back. That feeling returned, that feeling of oncoming power.

"It seems that I have opened the second gate. Feast on my chakra, Ankoku-sama. . ." Glowing black chakra came around his torso, flowing in and out of him. "Now, let's test this power. . . " His voice seemed overshadowed by something darker.

Drawing a kunai, Takara jumped out of the doorway just in time to escape being impaled by black dragon's jaws. It crashed the door and hall, then recoiled into the man's mouth.

When the dragon lashed out a second time, Takara was forced to flip backwards and threw the kunai, which missed and was ineffective. She had just recently gotten out of the hospital, and though the nurses advised her not to, she left without any bed rest. Aside from being beyond tired, she was in no way able to go into battle.

The man leapt out of the room at the same time that Takara's knees buckled.

She couldn't fight.

Squinting her eyes, only to have her vision blurred by tears, Takara watched with only one thought in her head, that made her feel stupid for having it be there: Prince Charming.

She was crying, one) because she saw her life coming to a close for a second time. And two) because she knew that he wouldn't come.

She never even got to find him.

Not a white stallion steed, but a golden headed dragon flew and clamped its jaws onto the neck of the black dragon that was targeting Takara. They tackled each other away until the savior dragon recoiled into Kichiro's mouth as he blinked out the concentrated chakra, but like that would stop the stinging. He had used too much chakra.

"Oto-san!" Takara looked up, in the utmost relief, to see her teammate, Kichiro, and her friend-- _Hinata_?! "What are you doing?"

Though, thanks to his son, the surging chakra subsided, Haraguroi's anger did not.

"Disposing of this unwelcome guest!" With malicious eyes to likes of which Takara had never seen, Kichiro's father turned to him. "_Kichiro_. . ." Such poison was injected into his words that Takara found herself physically recoiling. "How dare you defy me!!! Get **out**! GET OUT OF MY HOUSE **NOW**!!!"

Kichiro and Hinata leapt out of the path of a kunai, flung with the most absolute of chakra written into it. With all of the urgency he could muster, he swept up Takara and left with the greatest guilt from the curses being yelled at him by his very own father.

"DISHONOR! _DISHONOR_!!!"

. . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . .

"Ki---" Takara found herself trying to say something, _anything_, to dispel the dark silence that shrouded the three as Kichiro laid Takara down on the ground once they were a safe distance from the raging jonin, but she was surprisingly enough cut off by Hinata.

"Kichiro-kun. . ." Her voice was always soft, often interrupted by stutters, and scarcely there at all, but what she did say then held such heartfelt concern that Kichiro understood what she was asking.

"I'm all right, Hinata-chan," he waved away the hand that she held out to place on his shoulder. These sweetly exacted honorifics, chan and kun, did not go unnoticed by the hopeless blonde romantic, though she knew that this was by far not the time.

The two (possibly more than) friends turned as realization dawned on them as to who was in their company, a ghost in their eyes.

"No," Takara's swollen, red eyes began to fill up with tears that she thought she had run out of, "No, you're not, Kichi-kun."

The girl reached out with the expression of a lost, desperate child and hugged Kichiro into oblivion, just as she had done in the past hours with Isao, her mother, her father, and her sister.

That embrace of eternal, loving depth made Takara realize something astounding.

She had never hugged Kichiro before.

Of course, she had meagerly engaged him in teammate-group hugs, but never had she held him alone. He was her friend, and she couldn't think of any other friends that she hadn't hugged.

Wait, but there was. . .

"Takara-chan. . ." Kichiro was, without need to be said, surprised by the public display of emotion. Then, all of the guilt, the worry, the concern, and the sadness melted away, like strawberry ice cream in the warm sun.

His father could wait. Now he had his friend.

. . .

Kichiro awkwardly returned the embrace and after one tear-soaked moment, Takara broke into a fit of giggles. She held the Iga boy around his neck and shook him around as she bounced around.

"Kichi-kun, Kichi-kun, Kichi-kun, Kichi-kun!" She sang and sang, cracking at the congested tears trying to clog her voice.

She settled down and the frazzled Kichiro was grateful. Realizing that she had excluded someone, Taka turned and saw Hinata, a hand over her mouth, giggling like she did, for she was too shameless to outright laugh like she wanted to. (As per the harsh treatment delivered by her father, she learned to be ashamed of boldness.)

If Takara wasn't so consumed in her joy then she would have surely noticed the similarities between the situations of Hinata and Kichiro.

"Hina-chan. . ." Like a fleeing flea, running from a dog that had just been spritzed with flea-repeling spray, Takara jumped onto Hinata, who reacted with anything but grace to the girl's loving attack. "Hina-chan!"

"Hina-chan, Kichi-kun!!! Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh!!!!" Takara hugged as Hinata struggled against Taka's legs which her wrapped around her in a spider monkey-fashion.

Hinata's face was beat red from twisting and fighting when Takara gave up and fell onto the ground, choking on laughs. Hinata was at a loss for what to do, having just dropped her best friend, but she didn't seem too upset.

"Oh, you guys. . ." Takara, settling down from her giggles, laid her back down on the ground, arms splayed out beside her. She snapped back up in her joy. "You guys!"

Taka paced back and forth happily, as though mulling over something.

"We need to do something. Yeah! We need to go to a movie, or, um, make origami, or, um--- um-- bake a cake! Yeah, that's a good idea! We could--"

"Um, Takara-chan?" Kichiro interrupted her rather un-private rant. "Hinata-chan and I were coming back from training because we needed to relax. We could-- sit down for some tea, if you wanted to, but I guess I can't invite you into my home now."

"Kichiro-kun. . . " The two turned to Hinata. Though she badly wanted to stop them for the she had no means to back them up, the words climbing up her throat were pushing their way out. "You could st-stay with m-m-m-m-me until. . . ."

"Hinata-chan. . ." The moment of silence was short lived, for Takara was waiting to say something and she was determined to say it.

"'Hinata-chan', 'Kichiro-kun'. . . is there something that's happened between you two that I don't know about?"

Though Hinata and Kichiro both testified that it was a simple(and short lived) meeting of their fathers that brought them to meet each other, the redness of their faces made Takara suspicious that there was more to their relationship than just training.

"Well. . ." Takara was about to say something playfully snarky about her good friends' "just friends" relationships, but suddenly a pair of ANBU Black Ops passed overhead, heading in the direction of the apartment building that they had just fled.

It didn't take a ninja to figure out where they were going.

Kichiro and Hinata immediately leapt into action, onto the roof above them. Takara attempted to, but from lack of strength, lack of chakra, and just plan lack of gracefulness, she fell onto the ground with a grunt and an "oomph".

"Takara, you need to get away from here. You're in no condition to fight anyone."

Hinata kept her eyes toward the now probably destroyed apartment complex. Takara saw that her Byakugan was blazing with worry. The blonde simply nodded, slightly relieved that she was excused from the skirmish, and watched helplessly(like a damsel in distress?) as the two friends(or so they called themselves) made swift pace towards what was probably an epic battle scene.

A moment of unnecessary romantic imaginings(of some certain Iga and Hyuga) later, Takara picked herself up and made the long journey to Konoha red light district(all the while, cataloguing these said imaginings).

It was a place full of words that Takara wasn't even allowed to say at home. If her parents knew where she was venturing to, they would have locked her up in a tall, tall tower and never let her out(leaving her to grow out her hair and be saved by a man who climbed up it to reach her, though that was beside the point).

But she wanted to see Kaori-sensei, and that she would.

After making every attempt she could to avoid eye contact with the strange and terrifying people that walked the red light district, Takara finally arrived.

Knocking on the door to the run-down apartment that she had slinked as subtly as she could into, Takara heard some scary moaning and shouting noises coming from the inside.

Though she had been constantly reminded all throughout the day that she was in no condition to battle, Takara's sense of duty and care for her mentor forced her to run into the small apartment with haste.

What she saw made her run screaming out of the building and out of the neighborhood entirely, not looking back of halting in the slightest.

Kakashi and Kaori noticed but they didn't care to stop.

Takara felt her innocence leaving her. She wasn't allowed to say the f word. She certainly wasn't allowed to see it.

* * * * * * * * * *

_Colorful people,_

_Friends meet again._

_But really, can't the woman stay away_

_From her boyfriend?_

**IMPORTANT KITTYLO'S CORNER~**

**I wasn't expecting that ending at all. It just came to me and I had to do it.**

**For those who are still reading, I applaud you. But honestly, honestly, honestly, honestly, this chapter was painfully, wretched boring to write. My Naruto muse has abandoned me. Now, there's no way in hell that I'll end this series without the conclusion that I originally desired, but I'm No Princess is officially on HIATUS until further notice. As in, summer.**

**Now, I only have a few more chapters before the conclusion and then follow-up sequel(calling it Queen Of Hearts) which will take place in Shippuden, but those won't come for a long while, I guarantee it.**

**I'm just not as inspired by NARUTO as I once was. I guess seeing it on the TV really did it for me, making me want to write. Maybe I'll watch the DVDs and finish it up quick, but until then, this is KittyLo signing out:**

**Lots O' Love, KittyLo!**

**PS: The story that I will be working on, however, is coming shortly and is not NARUTO but Yu-Gi-Oh!. The writing I will attempt to make more professional and there will be a hidden point to it, other than romance. So, stay tuned, and I won't disappoint you.**


	41. An Ino Story: How A Heart Breaks

It's a strange thing, to go your entire life meeting different people, and realizing that they were all the same until you meet someone really different.

Girls Ino used to know were just like her, for the most part: obsessed with their goals, out there for themselves, without regret for what they did to get what they wanted.

But then, on an evening of playground-ing and dress up-ing like many before it, Ino came across a teary-eyed, pink-haired girl who would have more affect on her than she knew.

Her first instinct was to tease, to say something like "Crybaby, shut up," or "What's with you?", but instead, she reached out and touched, an enigma in action even to herself.

Ino said something that probably wasn't any more helpful.

"Everyone makes fun of your forehead, huh?" Because of course, she had heard the rumors.

Through thoroughly wet green eyes, that reminded Ino so much of over-watered green orchids, little Sakura asked, "Who are. . .?"

"I'm Yamanaka Ino. What about you?"

"I'm. . . Sakura. . . Haruno Sakura. . ."

"Ahh. . . I see. So this is the big forehead." It probably wasn't the nicest thing to say, but really, it was in Ino's nature.

Sakura whimpered like a wounded puppy.

"So you try to hide it with your hair." Ino touched the bangs and felt their course texture. "You look like a ghost."

"It's Sakura, right? Come here again tomorrow."

". . . Huh?"

"I'll give you something nice!"

The next day, at the same twilight hour, Ino found Sakura waiting for her in that exact same spot. This time her hair was thoroughly brushed, and by the impatient twiddling of her thumbs, Ino could only guess how long Sakura had been waiting there.

With a smile at the girl's readability, Ino went up and, with a sweetly snarky comment, tied a red ribbon she found at the bottom of her vanity drawer into Sakura's pink hair.

"See Sakura, you're much cuter this way." Of course, Ino thought, because it came from her own drawer. Her mother helped to make sure that Ino was at the forefront of the accessory world. "You can have that ribbon." Even though it wasn't much of a sacrifice, having been the ribbon she wanted the least, Ino beamed at Sakura's blushing face and cheery grin.

"Thanks, but. . ."

"But what?"

"My forehead. . ."

Ino frowned. "They make fun of it more 'cause you try to hide it. You have a cute face so show it off confidently. Confidently like a model!"

And thus a friendship budded.

Needless to say, none of Ino's other friends were happy about it, but instead of turning to see Sakura as a burden like she would have with anyone else, Ino defended Sakura. She taught her everything she knew, dragging her from boutique to clothes rack, ensuring her acceptance in the popular crowd.

Ino's friends didn't ease up, though, and went further to deny Sakura. The pink-haired wallflower came to see herself as a burden, but Ino didn't allow that.

For once in her life, there was someone--- someone different. Someone who didn't judge her. Someone who didn't just hang out with her because other people wanted to, someone who didn't just dress her up like a little glass doll for the other moms to be jealous of. She wasn't going allow anyone to take it from her.

Amongst the hordes of things that went through Ino's mind when she was alone, brushing her hair a thousand times at her vanity or organizing and reorganizing the azaleas in the flower shop, was that she was _completely_ alone.

She was on a deserted island all by herself, and though her parents and her friends thought that they knew her-- they were wrong.

They were all horribly wrong.

And she was fine, living her life until then-- until that fresh spring day, that day, oh, how she remembered-- when she first met Sakura.

Sakura was different then them.

She didn't think much of herself, but when the two of them sat in Ino's purple bedroom, with teeny-bopper magazines splayed out around them and half eaten mellorine cups melting under the vanity light bulbs, Ino felt like she could say anything.

And she did.

The errant, lonely thoughts that fluttered around under the surface of her conscious floated out, and every time, they turned celebrity small talk into a soulful heart-to-heart that scraped the forlorn, stinking sorrow from Ino's mind.

It was unlike anything. . . to know that kind of friendship.

So when anyone bad mouthed Sakura, there was hell to pay.

Whenever there was a sail at Pretty Pinkuredi, there was cash to pay.

Whenever a stupid bully stepped out of line, and thought that they could push around Sakura for the shy girl she used to be, there was Ino's angry, flailing inferno of fiery and girlish vengeance to pay.

It was a world of wonder, being the BFFFRs like they were. BFFFR standing for Best Friends Forever For Real, in comparison to all of the other BFFs they had who would as quickly turn on them as singer Asuka Rekazawa would on last season's shoes. (But the tendencies of Asuka Rekazawa are to delved into on a later date).

It was a shining moment for the world of a young girls. It made it seem as though all the struggles of childhood in the Ninja Nations were worth it.

But then boys came along.

And if anyone knows the dynamics of life as the living should, they know that blooming girls + sprouting boys = trouble.

One troublesome boy especially, though Ino didn't blame the handsome guy. She couldn't. Sasuke was just to irresistible to ever be mad at.

When the Uchiha joined the class, every girl fell head over sandals for the kid, forgetting every other past crush in favor of a black-haired mini-ninja.

At first, naivete Ino thought that it was perfect. Not only would she have the best friend in the world, but she planned on getting the best boyfriend, too.

And when she first heard that Sakura liked Sasuke, she didn't think much of it.

Maybe it was a little conceited, but Ino intended to win Sasuke in the end. It didn't seem like Sakura was thought crazy about him anyway, not nearly as much as she was. When Ino went on did-you-see-the-way-he-looked-at-me tangents, she wasn't thinking much of Sakura.

Time went on, and things escalated.

Sakura's face contorted noticeably when Ino loudly mused as to the theme of she and Sasuke's wedding, but Ino tried not to mind.

Somehow Sasuke was an isle away, a place where she wanted to be. But then, where she was with Sakura was such a paradise that she didn't realize that it could end.

"We're rivals from now on."

The words seemed so randomly sadistic, but Ino knew that they were coming. Sakura had somehow changed recently.

At first, Ino reacted as Ino would have: indignantly, aggressively.

But then, when she was alone again. . . the tears finally came. And they weren't happy.

She threw things, pretending Sakura was where they landed. She scratched out all of the pictures that Sakura was in with a green marker and smacked around all of the things that reminded her of her. All the mementos found themselves shoved in cabinets or under Ino's bed, ready to dust with her memories.

And Ino couldn't help it. She relived every moment of their last fight in her mind, ranting to her friends and family about how if Sakura wanted it to be that way, it was gonna be.

But then, when she was all alone _yet again_, she wondered to herself. . . was she really worth so little? Was Sakura's crush on Sasuke worth more than the years of friendship that they had?

All of her best friends always left her, somehow. But she thought Sakura was different. She thought she could _trust_ Sakura.

She thought wrong.

What was Sakura thinking all the time that they were together? Was she thinking how much she hated Ino? Was she secretly angry with her all along?

These were the things Ino desperately wanted to know, but she didn't ask anyone but her pillow, and it probably couldn't even hear her through her sobs.

Years went by, Ino thought she'd get over it. She didn't.

So what did she do?

The only thing Ino could do: she fought.

Every chance she could get, she'd put down Sakura. To her surprise, Sakura fought back.

Upon reflection of this with her mother(though Ino only showed her the steaming anger she felt about this), she said that Ino had created a monster.

They were two opposing forces, given, but on separate ends of the popularity spectrum.

Then along came a skittish blonde named Takara.

Ino loved to see Takara, she loved to talk to her. Almost instantly, it seemed, she assumed the role in Ino's life that Sakura had left empty.

She got along easier with Ino's friends than Sakura did, always portraying vacuous apparitions of fairy tale dreams. No one seemed to mind, though. Actress Kureha Kurosawa made hime-kei(princess style) clothing totally cute.

Around her, Ino didn't need to say anything sad; everything was just fun and happy. She never spoke a word of what she felt for Sakura, except that she was so pissed that the "Forehead Queen" was ungrateful to her.

But apparently, Ino was more transparent than she thought.

Whether it was the wet pillow case or the scratched up pictures, Takara defended more cruelly than she normally would have when Sakura tried comebacks on Ino.

Takara was wide-eyed and silent when Ino went on a Sakura-bashing streak, letting her let out all she had to.

Ino had no doubt that she knew.

But still, no matter how Ino pretended, it wasn't the same. Not at all.

It would take a long time for those kinds of wounds to heal.

Time went on as it does, and Ino joined her team. She thought that Shikamaru and Chouji were stupid at first, losers that she had to put up with. And it didn't help that Sakura got put on the same team as Sasuke.

But in the face of adversity, off on missions where the matter was life or death, Ino learned to trust the pair.

Things went back to the trust she used to have.

Then time went on. (Damn you, time.) The Chunin Exams proved to Ino that Sakura. . . she had changed. Not in a bad way, but in a way that made her wish that she knew the whole story.

Then, afterwards, after Orochimaru's attack on Konoha(which was a whole catastrophe itself), Ino learned that Sakura and Takara had been bonding. Furthermore, Ino learned that Takara and SASUKE had been bonding.

Maybe it was naive but Ino had some far-fetched thought that once she finally got Sasuke(because she didn't intend on losing him after what she and Sakura had gone through, that strengthened her resolve), Sakura would come back to her with her tail between her legs, and somehow, they would go back to normal.

Now that the small amount of trust that Ino's heart had managed to muster for her post-Sakura life was being threatened once again by whatever the hell Takara was doing, Ino went to see her friend, put she was still-- oh yeah-- in her coma.

Well, Ino was pondering this during another day at the grind-- tending to the family flower shop in the mornings, meeting with friends for lunch, and training until dusk-- when Sakura came in.

"Oi, Billboard-Brow, it's you."

"Ino," she gasped. Obviously, she had been running. "I heard from Naruto that Takara's awake."

That bitch.

* * *

_When life's a tragic parable,_

_There's not much you can do_

_But wait for someone less terrible_

_To lesson the weight for you._

_

* * *

_

**KITTYLO'S KORNER!**

**Gah. Most writers say, at the end of their chapters, "SA-SA-SA-SA!!!~ I LOVE WRITING!!", but not me. I HATE writing. I abhor it, I loathe it, I detest it.**

**But once I start, I can't stop. I have to finish. I get all sleepy in the brain and my fingers get hyper all over the key board. And I get really pissed when I'm interrupted.**

**And since I got my first review, I've been addicted. If it weren't for those, I'd so not continue. Especially with faithful reviewers, and those who give unique criticisms. I live for them.**

**Screw science homework, Ima' fanfic'n. Also I have a C- in science. D: In a comparative ratio to my update frequency, that's just pathetic.**

**Anyway, sorry for the last chapter that sucked ass hard. This one was better(and believe me, had relevance with what is gonna happen in the next chapter, and also with what's happening in my life right now(as inspiration), but for more details on the destruction of my life, check out .com/).**

**This chapter still kinda sucked, and I'm sorry for that, but if you want me to improve, review my any flames you can think of. I'd love it. :]**

**I have to say, though, it'll be fun to elaborate on the mechanics of Ino and Sakura's friendship where Masashi Kishimoto didn't.**


	42. Bitch Is Here! Drama Commences

If you happened to be in Konoha that warm day in the late summer, and happened to look behind the dumpster of the Koyonami Cafe on the Fifth Avenue in the Tea District, you would find a cowering thirteen-year-old blonde with her visit list clenched in her hands.

"Ka-Ka-Ka-Kaori-sensei w--was. . . ." Her terror built up into a scream that exuded her prudishness. "HAVING SEX!"

People turned to where the noise was coming from all around the block and birds fled.

Stuttering misunderstandings to people who weren't there, Takara pulled out her pencil stub and crossed her sensei's name out many, many times. She vowed never to return to that apartment uninvited again.

Sighing off what was sure to result in numerous nightmares, Taka looked to her list of friends to visit(after waking from an unsightly coma) and was delighted to see her BFFFRETCB(Best Friend Forever For Real Even Through Cute Boys, for those who are looking to know), Ino, was next on the list.

"Ooh! Ino-chan!" Takara was looking forward to that visit. It was sure to be an interesting visit.

. . .

Takara entered the Yamanaka Shop to see Ino, obviously extremely agitated, with her fists grounding into the counter and an irate mien about her.

"Hey--"

"Takara!" she aggressed, almost as though she had been waiting.

"Hey, In--"

"Don't "hey Ino-chan" me! I know what you've been doing, Takara!"

"Wait, Ino-chan-- what? I just woke up yesterday and I--"

"Are you sure youweren't just bonding with Bill-Board Brow behind my back?! And-- AND! You've been hanging out with Sasuke-kun behind my back!"

Takara was stricken speechless. Those things were probably the farthest from her mind at the time being, but looking at it that way--

"Well?!" Ino was expression was surely seething. She was entering the state of livid, choleric psycho bitch, but Takara had never taken the full impact of her ferocity before.

"What do you have to say for yourself, Takara?!" Ino's expression and features were completely enraged, but her eyes read something along the lines of "say it ain't so".

"Well. . ."

"Well?" Ino pardoned.

"Well, Kakashi-san asked me to watch Sasuke, and--"

"And you didn't tell me?!" Looking back on it, it probably would have been a good thing to do, to let out the truth, but it probably would have ended the same, anyway.

"Wait, Ino, let me say something--"

"No, let me tell _you _something, Shizute Takara! How _stupid _was I to ever freakin' trust you! I wouldn't have gotten mad at you if you had just told me the truth!"

It was silent for a moment.

"Okay, I might have! But still! That wouldn't have been as bad! _You _just didn't tell me because you wanted Sasuke-kun all to yourself! You were playing Sakura, too, weren't you?! Trying to keep her and I both out of the way!"

"Ino, wait a minute here! I wasn't--"

"Don't try to hide it, Takara! I saw the red chrysanthemum you were bringing Sasuke! Those mean "I love you"! You know that!"

"What?! I--"

By now, Ino's face was red, her eyes were bulging and wet, and her muscles were tensing all over.

"Get out of my store!"

"Ino--"

"**Get out!**"

It was silent.

Ino's last scream echoed amongst the flower petals and the coins in the cash box jingled.

All was quiet, aside from Ino's deep breaths. Takara, who's saddened expression didn't hinder Ino in the least(or not in a way she showed), turned to leave, the bell above the door, to signal entrance, jingled.

"Is--"

"Takara-chan!" Isao drew in his breath quickly, showing that he had been running. "Oh-- Ino!"

"What do you want, Manabu?" It was at least nice for Takara to know that she wasn't the only one receiving the brunt of Ino's anger.

"It's the Uchiha," he gasped, capturing his breath yet again.

"Sasuke?" Takara was immediately worried. "What happened?"

"He's left Konoha."

* * * * *

_To know betrayal_

_Brings fiery vice_

_And now the princess_

_Pays the price._


	43. Balloon Effect: Too Much Pressure!

Ninjas were supposed to have control over their emotions, to have a hold on how they felt.

Takara was deeply lacking in the emotional constraint department.

The girl grind her teeth so hard that some even chipped to keep from crying as she, Ino, and Isao hurried at a pace only ninja were capable of towards the Hokage Tower.

Sasuke? _Leaving_? What the hell?! Takara mentally covered her mouth. Even in haste, she scarcely could break her prude-en ways. But it was no time to think about that! She had to, she had to-- she had no idea. She didn't know what she would do. It was times like this, times when the real, harsh world broke into her frilly reveries that she felt totally useless. She couldn't--

"TAKARA!" the blonde heard as she jerked around, ready to yell back at Ino, who motioned her to enter the building. The three made silent swiftness towards Lady Tsunade's office.

Bursting in, the trio cut through the intense aura that Kakashi and Tsunade were exuding like a knife through cold butter.

"Lady Tsunade!" Ino quite literally shouted. The woman held up her hand.

"I realize what you've come in for. It's what everyone's been bursting in for all day." She whispered the latter to herself. "I already had a team on it--"

"Who?" Isao urged. Who knew that Isao cared what happened to Sasuke?

"I've assigned Nara Shikamaru--"

"Shikamaru?!" Takara roared. Everyone else in the room stared at her half quizzically and half angrily.

"Yes, Shikamaru. Hyuga Neji--" Takara took a sharp breath to keep from gasping. "Akimichi Choji, Inuzuka Kiba, and Uzumaki Naruto. I've also sent a message to the Sand Village for reinforcements because they surround that region and two teams of medics." Tsunade looked to Takara as though she expected her to scream again.

A few jaws opened and closed as though debating speech and Tsunade sighed deeply.

"Well, I guess I can't prevent you from going after them, Kakashi. Takara, you go with him."

"Why Takara?!" Ino demanded.

"Because she has the medical skills required. Why don't you and Isao go to the hospital to wait for them?"

Whence the room was cleared, Isao took off to avoid Ino who growled in Taka's general direction before leaving as well.

"Takara," Kakashi called. "I'll give you minutes to gather what you need and meet me at the gate before I leave without you." And he was gone before she could answer.

* * *

Takara was never a master of taijutsu. That never seemed like too much of a problem until she was pushing her hardest to keep up with Kakashi, jumping from branch to branch, as he was quite obviously slowing down for her.

"Speed up," he ordered for the fifteenth time.

"Why," she huffed. "Why don't you hurry ahead of me?" Before she finished her sentence he was gone from her sight.

The hour that followed proceeded with her embarrassment over her lack of physical finesse with a feeling of imminent doom from the situation at hand. She promised to train harder next time and to achieve a stronger handle on taijutsu-- as well as the tears that only now prodded her eyeslids.

Taka came upon an open area where four medics hurriedly pawing at a person lying on the ground.

She approached and one turned around to ask(though more like shout), "Do you have any capriole balm?!" Her rests shook as she quickly pulled it out. The medic mixed it with a grey powder and lathered the sleeping boy's top lip with it as a smelling salt to keep him from completely falling out.

Taping a headset on his ear, one medic again shouted, "Akimichi isn't responding to the salve!" A fuzzy voice ordered something back, and one medic unfolded a stretcher, placed Choji on it, and two of the medics took off with it.

The other two medics leapt into the trees with Takara(thankfully) at their pace. Two minutes later, she asked, "That was Choji-san?"

The medic only nodded and Takara's eyelids began to flood again.

* * *

It only took thirty seconds for the medics to decipher that Hyuga Neji was in severe condition and needed to be immediately taken back to the Konoha Hospital for better medical attention.

This extremely convenient, because the second they were gone, the tears exploded like paper booms and spilt like blood done Takara's face as she proceeded(thankfully) alone. Wiping desperately at her face, Takara completely wetted the inside of her vest by dousing it in her tears.

Furthering her shinobi sins, Taka was completely off her guard when a boy in black approached with another boy on his back.

"Takara?" The boy was Kiba, but the boy in black-- Taka knew that she had seen him before. He set Kiba down on a branch with a grunt from the boy with an unconscious dog in his arms. "Glad you're here. You're a medic, right?"

Takara nodded and pulled out a pouch of yarrow ointment, but stopped when she heard Kiba add, "Can you heal Akamaru?"

"Your dog?" she pardoned.

"Yeah. Can you tell me if he's gonna be okay?" Takara knew that Kiba adored his dog(that was with him ALL THE TIME), but she didn't know the loyalty went to that extreme.

"I'll see what I can do."

Takara laid a cloth down and laid Akamaru on top of it. She gently massaged broom malice poultices onto the large, open wounds and sprinkled marigold leaves on top to prevent infection. She slipped a poppy seed down his throat to induce sleep and prevent pain, followed by huckleberry and goldenrod.

Having done all she could do, Taka quickly bandaged the more serious cuts and bundled the puppy in the cloth.

"Now let me--"

"No, I'll be fine." Kiba attempted to stand up and fell.

"You're not fine. Just let me--"

"No, we've got a mission to complete and--"

"I have a mission, too, and my mission is to help you, so--"

"Well--"

The boy in black who Takara had previously ignored placed a thick hand on Kiba's shoulder, not in a caring gesture, but in more of a threat.

"Hey man, let the girl do her work."

Kiba glared up at him. "Hey, don't we have something to do? We can't spend any more time lying around," Kiba pushed the boy's hand off of his shoulder, "and you can't make me."

The boy's eyebrows noticeably popped.

* * *

Takara found it very hard to apply medicine to Kiba, especially when he was kicking, screaming, and sprawling for freedom with the boy-- Kankuro, as Kiba had so cursed him-- holding his arms behind him.

"Will you cut it out?!" Kankuro shouted.

Growling and barking his anger, Kiba simply refused.

"Let me try something," Takara mused, more to herself than to Kankuro. She performed the rat sign with her hands and focussed her chakra into her fingers. Once they were glowing blue, she lifted them down to Kiba's squirming neck carefully and pinched the nerve in his neck.

"What are you--" His body fell limp. "What the hell did you do?!!" Kiba's entire body, limbs and all, were completely motionless aside from his thrashing neck, barking mouth, and twitching foot.

"There we go." Takara smiled as she bandaged the boisterous boy. Not until he was thoroughly bandaged did she attempt to fling Kiba over her shoulder-- and fail.

"Ugh-- shit! What the hell?!" Kiba continued to scream.

"Oh-- sorry."

Kankuro chuckled and with one arm flung Kiba over his shoulder. "You take the dog."

As tenderly as she could, Takara took up Akamaru in her arms and followed behind Kankuro as quickly as she could. They all proceeded in silence for even Kiba realized what there was to come.

* * *

_Frightful situations_

_Birth ghastly reveries._

_The princess in distress_

_Proves to still be weak._


	44. Quiet And Cold

Like a cold bucket of water, relief fell over Takara when she, Kiba, and Kankuro caught up with Temari and Shikamaru. Finding that their only wound was Shikamaru's broken finger was better than when the live action Snow White movie was announced to be in the making.

It wasn't long after (though it seemed as so) when the five came across and large field with men in white coats, a boy with red hair, and a boy in green.

Takara's spine stiffened when as they approached the group and everyone but Kiba noticed.

"I--" Lee struggled to stand. "I refuse! We have a mission to complete and Kakash-sensei is--"

"Hatake-san gave us orders to return to Konoha with the team as soon as everyone was recovered."

"But everyone is not recovered! Naruto-kun and Sasuke-san--"

"Hatake-san told us to return once you all were recovered--"

"But we have a duty! I refuse to--"

"Lee," Gaara spoke commandingly from behind him. "In your condition, you are of no use to him."

"But--"

Gaara stood and walked toward his siblings as though the matter was already settled.

"If you want to be able to help on your next mission, you have to rest and be healed. There's no point in tagging along."

"You're right," Lee nodded and attempted again to stand but failed. Two medics caught him on his way down and before Takara could catch his eye, Gaara and his siblings had lunged into the forest, back towards Konoha.

* * *

Silence shrouded the group as they made their way through the forests and fields. Only thoughts clouded heavier than the dense quietness:

_"That was so strange. . . that's not how I remember Gaara at all."_

_"What are these vibes I'm getting Taka? She's acting weird."_

_"I may be wrong, but I think that's the girl from the Chunin Exams that was following Gaara for a while."_

_"That's definitely the girl Gaara hospitalized. Shouldn't she be dead?"_

* * *

Takara twiddled her thumbs in wait with Temari and Shikamaru. She had splinted his broken thumb and now he twiddled just the same as the two sat opposite Temari whose legs were crossed.

"There's no use in fidgeting," Temari spoke, bravely slicing the tensity.

"Sacrifice is an inevitable part of missions. Didn't you receive emotional training?" Takara had a feeling that that training was much more severe in Suna than it was in Konoha, due to the difference in their reactions to the situation.

After a characteristic sigh, Shikamaru responded, "Training and actual combat are different. In a mission, you don't know what's going to happen."

He sighed again, excessively, and continued, "And I. . . was a team leader for the first time on this mission. . ."

"Because of that, I understand. . ." Temari pardoned and Takara felt inclinced to say something but couldn't find a voice to speak with.

"I'm not cut out to be a shinobi," Shikamaru pronounced.

Temari's eyes didn't move an inch from Shikamaru's listless, worried eyes while Takara's jolted towards Shikamaru in shock.

"Unexpected fragility. . . men are strange. . ." Temari mumbled as Shikamaru got up and slowly paced down the hall.

"I shouldn't have been the team leader this time. . . I just trusted everyone else. I was laid-back. . . I didn't have enough strength. . . It's all my fault."

"Shikamaru!" Takara finally found words, but they were in a voice that she didn't recognize.

"Are you afraid of being hurt?" Temari pressed.

Shikamaru didn't respond to either girl and walked down the hall slowly. Takara stood up to follow him but stopped after a few steps.

"Shikamaru," a man who Takara didn't notice was leaning on the corner spoke.

"You're being talked down to by a girl and running away. . .?"

"I don't want to have a troublesome argument. I'm not a girl."

If the situation was not so laced with tense sadness, Takara might have felt a tinge of sexism.

"Yes. . . but you're also not a man."

Shikamaru continued walking.

"You're just a regular coward."

Now Takara found footing and followed him again, only to stop a few steps before the man, feeling like breaking their silent battle would mean something bad.

"Even if you quit being a shinobi, missions will occur. Someone will carry them out. Your comrades will just go out with a new leader. So then, maybe your comrades will die. . . But if you're their leader that time, you comrades may reach the end. If you look at this time as an experience and learn from it. . . maybe you can carry out your missions with less problems. . ."

Thus proceeded a moment of silence.

Shikamaru's back remained turned.

"If your comrades are really important to you. . . consider that you may become greater for the sake of your friends!"

The loudest stillness that Taka had ever heard followed but was short lived.

"That's what it means to be a real shinobi! You coward!"

Taka noticed-- out of the corner of her eye-- Temari's face betraying her, showing true sympathy, when the door slid open to reveal the Fifth Hokage.

"It's all right now." She sounded relieved herself.

Sitting down, Tsunade announced, "The continuous cell destruction effect of the pills was stopped by an antidote that I put together. This time, he was saved. . . it was a success.

"I used a special drug-mixing manual from the Nara clan. There were some serious components in that. The result of a continual study?"

"Thank--" the man began, but he was cut short.

"Tsunade-sama!" Shizune rushed down the hall, evident sweat drops on her face. "Hyuuga Neji. . . his condition has stabilized!"

She pumped in three breaths before she again spoke. "Also. . . I have some information. Just now, Hatake Kakashi and Uzuamki Naruto have returned. And although he was injured, his life is in no danger."

If every extreme ninja mission that Takara was sent on involved so many rigid hushes, Takara would stick to hospital duty.

"Two of them, huh?" Tsunade's eyes turned to the ground. "Shikamaru, it seems your mission was a failure. But. . ."

Shikamaru's back began to tremble.

"Everyone's alive. That's more important than anything."

That was when Takara saw Shikamaru's first tear hit the floor.

"Next time, definitely. . . I'll show that I can do it flawlessly!"

No longer capable of containing herself, Takara ran to Shikamaru, not caring if she was judged by the Sand girl or embarrassed in front of the Hokage. She hugged her friend and whispered the first thing that came to mind.

"Stop crying, you jackass. Or I'm gonna cry, too."

With one arm, he wiped his face and with the other he pushed off Takara with his palm on her forehead.

"Get off of me, woman."

Shikaku almost felt inclined to mention the red on his son's face but chose not to.

Giggling in a most un-shinobi-like manner, Takara suggested, "Hey, why don't we go see Naruto-kun? He's back, right?"

"Yeah." Shikamaru put his hands into his pockets.

"Thank you, Tsunade-sama," Takara bowed and Shikamaru waved, a testament to his casualty. "Buh-bye, Temari-san." Shikamaru again waved.

Shikamaru nodded at the man and Takara mouthed to him from behind Shikamaru's back, _thank you_.

* * * * * * * * * *

_Silence can be louder_

_Sometimes than one can shout._

_With intense, rigid quiet--_

_All tears fall out._

**AUTHOR'S CORNER**

**I told you I'd update, didn't I? And you didn't believe me. Ha!**

**So, did it suck? How were the characters? I was especially afraid of writing Gaara.**

**Well-- if all goes as planned, I'll update tomorrow, the next, and the day after. And IMNP will be concluded! There'll be a sequel, if you can handle it.**


	45. His Ninja Way

Shikamaru knew that it didn't take a genius to avoid two fighting women; he took special care to avoid the path between Ino and Takara. He didn't know what was going on but the vibes were pretty scary.

"Ino-chan?" Takara began.

"Yes?" Ino hissed, arms crossed and totally ignorant of the confusion on the face of the man behind her.

Taka pursed her lips, as though contemplating something, then said, "Choji-san's condition has stabilized."

Letting her arms fall to her sides, Ino let go of her lust for conflict.

"Oh." Placing a steadying hand on her heart, she nodded to the man behind her (presumably Choji's father, from the looks of him) and they proceeded down the hall, the man nodding to Taka and patting Shikamaru's back while Ino bid him goodbye, ignoring Takara completely.

When they were alone again, slowly wandering down the hall, Shikamaru asked, "What was that all about?"

"I have no idea. Ino-chan got all mad at me all of a sudden when I went to go see her after I woke up."

"Oh." And again there was silence.

* * *

Kichiro sat down next to Hinata, and though she felt like she should say something, she couldn't find the words.

"Is. . . is your father okay?"

Sighing, Kichi replied, "His condition has stabilized, but they're taking him to the prison."

In the quiet that followed, Kichiro decided that Hinata wouldn't ask, but he wanted her to know.

"It was our clan's jutsu. . ."

"Wha? . ."

"The Kuro Tatsudoshi, dark year of the dragon. It's. . . a clan jutsu of ours." Kichiro looked from the floor to Hinata's eyes and continued.

"It can only be used during the year of the dragon, but it's been forbidden because it can decay your mind and eat at your conscious. He was only in the first stage of it, and if the ANBU hadn't captured him, he might have done more than just jump Takara."

This was the reason that he had feared becoming too attached to the villagers of Konoha. He knew something like this would happen, and what would he do when it was him that couldn't contain his Kekkei Genkai?

"Ki-- Kichiro-kun . . ."

After a noiseless moment, Hinata placed a trembling hand on his shoulder.

* * *

Like when Akira Kurosawa acted the part of Aurora in the Sleeping Beauty movie and _toooootally_ got the character wrong, Naruto didn't look like himself, sullenly hunched over with his eyes on his knees in that hospital bed.

The urge to hug came over Takara when she saw him but his many bandages advised her otherwise.

"Well, well. You're awake." Shikamaru was the first to speak.

"Shikamaru!" Naruto broke from his motionlessness and looked momentarily ecstatic to see him. "T--Takara!" He seemed to be surprised that she showed up.

"So. . . everyone's safe." That was the first time Taka saw Naruto twiddle his thumbs.

Shikamaru sat down on Naruto's bed and Takara felt comfortable enough to slowly step into the room.

"That's good." That blankness came back.

"And Sasuke. . ." Shikamaru began.

". . . yeah," Naruto answered.

Realization dawned on Takara and she drew sharp breath.

"He got away. . ." Naruto admitted.

"The information has spread quickly." Tsunade appeared in the doorway.

"Naruto. . ." Sakura was behind her, and the look on her the expression on her face filled up Takara's eyes.

Both Shikamaru and Taka looked back at Naruto (at very different speeds) to see Naruto's eyes fill up with pain-- a deep pain-- and look away.

"I heard that you were severely wounded," Tsunade spoke, "but you're fine now."

All eyes in different directions, mouths stayed close and the sound of sunset was the loudest noise they heard.

"I'm sorry. . ." Naruto agonized over his words. "Sakura-chan." He truly cared for her.

"Why're you apoligizing?" Sakura's eyes crinkled uncomfortably to fit her smile. "You look really weird. You're just like a mummy, aren't you?" She went into the room and opened the curtains.

"I'm sorry. . . I. . ." Everyone in the room pretended that those weren't tears in his eyes.

"Listen, the weather's good today." Sakura seemed in denial. "I opened the curtains, now. . ."

"Sakura-chan! I-- I'll definitely keep my promise!! I said that it was a lifelong promise. . ."

"It's all right, Naruto. . ." Though it clearly was not.

"Sakura!" Shikamaru shouted. "He's trying to. . ."

"Always. . ."

Naruto interrupted.

"Like I said. . ."

A unforeseen smile broke out on the boy's face. "I won't go back on my word! Because that's my ninja way."

Sakura bit her lip.

And the room was heavy.

"Hee hee hee. . ." Little chuckles came from the blonde boy on the bed, all bandaged, indeed looking quite silly, and his grin was contagious.

Sakura walked out of the room, but before she was gone:

"I'm sorry, Naruto. . . I had to make you wait a while but. . ." She looked back at him, smiling. "Next time, we'll do it together!"

* * *

_A ninja's way, a promise _

_That next time I'll be strong._

_Time will only tell_

_If they're right or wrong._


	46. Her Ninja Way

"Hey, Takara," Shikamaru called before she turned down the concrete hall.

"Yeah, Shika-kun?"

"Ugh," he ugh-ed, rubbing his forehead. "Still with the nickname?"

"Always," she smiled cheekily.

"You wanna go? . . ." He motioned towards his direction, hoping that would be enough.

"Go where?"

_"Clueless."_

"I mean, to the field."

"Oh." Takara paused for a moment. "In a little. First I gotta do something."

Shikamaru nodded and watched her leave without a smile.

* * *

Down the hall, Takara made her way-- not with a purpose, like she had let Shikamaru believe, but so that she could swallow all of her emotions without suffering any type off metaphorical indigestion.

"For the preservation of my pupil's youth!"

Maito Gai dashed up out of a hospital room in haste.

Curiosity peaked and, as she passed, Takara peeked into the room to see Rock Lee, bandaged in his bed, crying with manly devotion.

"Gai--- sensei--"

And, leaning against the wall in the corner of the room, Sabaku No Gaara stood-- smiling.

Smiling?

Takara did a double take.

Smiling.

"Your sensei is very important to you, isn't he?" He spoke.

Was it really Gaara?

The tears dissolved as Lee turned to Gaara.

"Yes! Gai-sensei is my idol! Someday I wish to be as splendid a ninja as he is!"

Gaara closed his eyes and nodded, as though taking it in.

"Takara-san!" Lee called out to the girl poking out from around the door and she jumped to the wall on the other side.

"Takara-san?" He called again.

"He--Hey, L-Lee-san, Ga--Gaara-san." Taka pealed herself off of the wall and hesitantly stepped into the doorway.

"Are you all right, Takara-san?"

"Of course, L---Lee-san." Takara didn't dare let her eyes leave Lee's.

"Did--" Takara searched her mind for something to say. Something. Anything. Two green eyes on her were boring in to her, too powerful for her to bear.

Gaara's eyes had a kind of presence. They weren't specifically radiant, or glistening, or spectacular, but they seemed to control the weight of the room. Sometimes the weight of the world; they were so heavy. And at that moment, they were on her.

"Did--- Did you like the flower that Sakura-chan brought you?"

Lee's mouth opened but no noise came out.

"Sakura-san. . . brought me that flower?"

For a second Gaara's eyes shifted.

"Sakura-san brought me a flower! Yes! Gai-sensei! Sakura-san brought me a flower! Ha-HA!"

Takara giggled, unaware that the world's weight sat on her at the moment, and turned on her tail with a wave, thinking that Sakura would pay her back for that later.

* * *

The sun was set. Clouds passed the waning half moon.

Takara, exhausted and more than tempted to just go home, walked up the hill and found Shikamaru-- same spot as every time before, looking very plantlike.

He turned and saw her lie down beside him.

The stars were the only ones that spoke.

Shikamaru, uncomfortably content, heard beside him stifled hiccups and uneven breaths.

Turning, he saw Takara eye-locked on the stars and quivering with sobs.

"What--"

"Shik--" She hiccuped. "Amaru. . ."

She jerked up, attempting wiping her eyes and failing.

He sat up beside her and tried to see her hidden eyes.

A minute passed.

"Come on. I don't know how to cheer up a crying girl."

"Shikamaru." She took in sharp breath. "I-- I want to find my ninja way, too. I want to be strong for--for everyone, too."

He waited until her whimpers subsided.

"Someday."

He seemed to think for a moment.

"If you stop crying."

She slapped his back.

"You don't know how to cheer up girls, at all."

She seemed to think for a moment.

"Stupid frog."

Or quite possibly, not.

* * *

_Given weeks, given years_

_Who knows what a day will allow?_

_Crying stalwart dreaming tears,_

_The Future is present and now._

_And who's to say what it will be?_

_A triumphant grail? A broken reverie?_

_No ninja wears a fairy-wrought dress._

_Strong or weak? The Ninja Princess?_

_

* * *

  
_

**AUTHOR'S CORNER**

**. . . do you BELIEVE?**

**. . .**

**If you do, review. XD**


	47. A Farewell

Congratulations! You've reached the finale. :D

Refreshments can be found to your left.

If you've come this far as a reader, I have to thank you.

If you have any interest in continuing this series being continued (or in how it came to be), here's some info:

The idea for I'm No Princess came to me from a friend whom I've lost (through affairs of the average teenage girl, and thus my apathy in writing for the past-- say-- year). (Yeah. For details, see chapter 42. Poor Ino-chan.)

It was supposed to be a self-insert (oh shit) of me, going through fan girl stages with the characters as I, as a fan, had fallen in love with them.

Thankfully, in writing, the character morphed from me and became Takara, a girl admittedly similar to me but contrasting in many ways.

To those who have noted Takara's Mary Sue-ic tendencies, bravo! You have eyes.

I assure you that in the sequel (Queen Of Hearts, that will be better than it sounds) her character will be greatly improved, along with the plot in general.

I have a lot of work to do. I've written more for this than any other fan fic in my writing history and I owe it something excellent.

I'm still fuzzy on exactly what to do, but I have a general idea. (Because fairy tale fantasies get poached in the ninja world.)

I'm not blind and asking for guidance, but this little survey will help me to perfect it to the point of reader acceptability.

That's your cue! If you give a damn, review the answers to these questions for a new and improved fan fiction that will not disappoint.

1) Is there too much Takara? It feels that way.

2) Is Takara too sugary? Do you have trouble believing her?

3) I know there's Mary Sue, but if there's any specific point that has bothered you, point it out.

4) Are there any characters that I've got specifically OOC? Or any that you thought were done well?

5) Motifs, baby. I'm talkin' themes You got an idea? Put it on me.

6) Which was your favorite chapter? Is there a reason why?

7) Which chapter was the worst? (Besides chapter 40, Friends And Family. That one doesn't count, I already know it was terrible.)

8) Too much prose? I feel like I describe emotions too thoroughly that it becomes frilly.

9) I know I'm a bad poet, but what did you think of the little cutesy poems at the end?

10) ONE WORD! Tell me something you'd like in the story in one word.

11) Character spotlight! Anyone you'd like in it more?

12) Comedy! Drama! Angst! Tell me what you want to see. Be choosy.

Tell me what you think.

In the mean time, I redirect you to another fan fiction I'm writing (in the Yuugiou fandom) titled I'm Your Venus.

Much better from the beginning than I'm No Princess, and I've got a solid idea for what I'm doing. It should be done by the end of July, or August, at most.

What can I say? I LOVE YOU GUYS! Even if I don't say it enough Wait for the lose ends to get tied up in the next fic.

Queen Of Hearts? Not quite what it sounds, but y'all have kept me up throughout this.

I bow, I blow kisses, and I make me exit.

Part II will follow the Intermission.


End file.
